Responsible Voters Start With Defaults: No On Propositions, Yes On Recalls
A recall can be a greater exercise in democracy than a general election
Democracy is like a leaky roof: if you want to reduce damage and costs, you fix it before the downpour of election noise.
In contemporary America especially, primary and general elections have a long leadup, and unless one feels especially driven to promote an issue or candidate, it’s reasonable to expect that, by election day people will be ready to vote (or not) according to their guidelines — and that regardless of their views (or lack thereof), few would blame them for exasperation with the extensiveness or media of the process.
But special elections are a different matter; their timing, or even existence, depends on the voice of citizens. And regardless of your position on the vote in the works, you might well see value in shaping the process early, such as:
Keeping vital civic options open: Signing a recall petition doesn’t obligate you to vote in favor of the recall should the petition qualify…but as long as others are going to the trouble, why not help keep choices open during changing times?
Overcoming sloppiness or deceit: With all the unreliable political predictions and black swan events of recent years, why should projections of valid signatures or expectations of proper tallying be any different? Voting has been chronically exhorted; Maybe the zeitgeist will shift to encourage nonscheduled voting by the time you see the need for a recall, and those who disagree might help you.
Not taking voting for granted (the way we did with the Constitution before lockdowns and cancel culture): I don’t just mean that we’re in a “freer country” than others are. It’s not enough to say we can vote in the United States, for the majority of states don’t allow takebacks when circumstances change — or when character is revealed.
At this time, it might be apparent that the possibility of Gavin Newsom being recalled is the motivation for this story — but whatever his critics would say, I think they would agree he doesn’t deserve to be singled out. Who can know if Andrew Cuomo would have risked commingling Covid patients with nursing home residents if New York allowed recalls?
Leveraging the costs of recalls: Isn’t leveraging a powerful-sounding concept that could launch regular people up to the level of “The Man”? Newsom tried to dismiss being the target of a recall by deriding it as expensive. Does that sound like a leader who’s proud of his efforts, who expects citizens to unite behind his effectiveness, who is confident in his state’s education to fuel the wisdom of its citizenry? Anyway, as long as the overly cautious point to cost as justification to preserve the status quo, why not take advantage of that to discourage active elected officials from tempting malcontents who aren’t so constrained?
Even if the recall votes (or even the signatures) are insufficient, that doesn’t mean the targets won’t be jolted into changing their ways.
Recalls can serve as a surprise inspection: Are winning candidates keeping their campaign (or later) promises, like following the science? They’ll claim this, but they can’t so easily demand that you accept their ideas of science or equality under the law.
Don’t fall for bloc issues: Especially in a large or diverse state, there may be good reasons to recall someone that few are discussing. These cannot be ignored even if others are right to call attention to the relative lack of substance in splashier claims.
Image matters if it’s important to the officials involved: The prior paragraph link asserts Newsom shouldn’t be recalled for the optics of an unmasked group lunch to celebrate a lobbyist’s birthday, but it’s harder for a governor who frequently asserts “we’re all in this together” to claim that such symbolism is irrelevant (as in the “following the science” link above) without demonstrating transferrable hypocrisy.
Politicians aren’t subject to normal laws: Not for murder when their shutdown policies trigger an increase in suicides, not for harmful child development when these vaunted champions of public education criminalize teaching via facial expressions, nor for theft when they can’t scientifically justify damaging economic policies. Certainly not for turning pricey nursing homes into Covid wards or even being found in violation of their state’s constitution by using fearmongering as an excuse for negligent election security. Need I go on?
Even some opponents have dismissed the Newsom recall on the grounds that no Republican could win enough votes to be his replacement. They may be right to claim there’s minimal difference in the philosophies of those who might win, but the candidates themselves are certainly chronically in competition with each other.