Two Books on American Elections

Two new books explore the deeply troubled election system in the United States. The editors of Electoral Reform present the work of a scholarly task force created in the wake of the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by supporters of President Donald Trump. The volume’s premise is that institutional defects in the electoral system give extreme candidates and factions an undue voice, producing a disproportionate number of extremist winners. These outcomes further polarize politics and lessen trust in governing institutions, so much so that Americans now express a similar level of confidence in their government as do people in autocratic, dysfunctional Venezuela. The study examines potential solutions in alternative voting methods and structures, including proportional representation for legislatures and state offices (as opposed to the single-member winner-take-all system), alternatives to partisan primaries, changes to the presidential nomination process, and campaign finance reforms. This scholarly volume presents deep, data-based analysis of various possible reforms, the tradeoffs that would be entailed, and the uncertain outcomes of adopting any new system. In the end, the authors can agree on little except to urge experimentation at the state level with nonpartisan primaries and ranked-choice voting, based on the model currently in use in Alaska.

Whereas the previous volume is geared toward specialists, Troiano addresses the general reader in a passionate, highly readable, and compelling argument, based in part on personal experience running for Congress, that, interestingly, reaches much the same conclusion. He argues that the single biggest problem among the many that afflict the American political system is partisan primaries—that is, primaries open only to voters registered with one of the two major parties. Because so many House districts are dominated by a single party, in 2022 roughly 30 million registered voters (independents and members of the minority party) couldn’t vote in the election that effectively determined who would represent them in Congress. In that year, Troiano has calculated, eight percent of voters cast ballots in the primary contests that determined 83 percent of House members. Two astoundingly simple principles would yield a dramatically improved system: all eligible voters must be able to vote in a primary regardless of party; and to prevail, a candidate must win a majority of the vote rather than a plurality. Ranked-choice voting, also known as an instant runoff, produces a majority winner. Its implementation would ensure that if one’s first choice is a lesser-known candidate, one could then also vote for a better-known and more likely candidate. The vote would thereby reflect one’s true beliefs while still materially influencing the outcome of an election. At least theoretically, this system would provide an incentive for candidates to build broad coalitions near the center. Studies and actual practice suggest that such a system would substantially raise turnout while also producing winners who more closely reflect the demographic and partisan identities of their constituencies.