GOP purity: “We do not serve Independent voters”

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Back in January, the Republican National Committee at its winter meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii (you know, that exotic foreign-sounding place not really a part of America even though it is the fiftieth state for more than 50 years) adopted a "Republican Platform Test" over the more stringent "GOP Purity Test" that had earlier been proposed. Republican Platform Test Adopted Over Purity Test For GOP Candidates:

The Republican National Committee… adopted a rule that will prod GOP leaders to provide financial support to only those candidates who support the party's platform.

The resolution, enacted by voice vote with no opposition at the party's winter meeting here, is an alternative to a more stringent proposal that would have required GOP candidates to support 10 policy positions if they wanted party help.

* * *

It urges leaders of local, state and national Republican parties to "carefully screen" the voting record and positions of Republican candidates that want party backing, and determine whether they "wholeheartedly support the core principles and positions" of the party as laid out in its platform.

After being crowned homecoming queen at the Tea Party Convention last week, former half-term Alaska Governor Sarah Palin told tea party activists to "pick a party" rather than run their own candidates. Palin: Tea Partiers "Have to Pick a Party" – CBS News:

"Now the smart thing will be for independents who are such a part of this Tea Party movement to, I guess, kind of start picking a party," Palin said… And then because the Tea Party movement is not a party, and we have a two-party system, they’re going to have to pick a party and run one or the other: ‘R’ or ‘D’."

Palin … mentioned that her husband Todd was not a registered Republican and that the party should be open to embracing independents.

Well, not so fast there missy. The Arizona Republican Party has other ideas. The party that once championed open primaries in Arizona now wants to close its primaries to independent voters to maintain GOP purity. State GOP looking to close its primary to independents:

Lawyers for the state Republican Party are huddling to try to find out how they can close their primary election.

Republican leaders who attended a mandatory state meeting last month voted to put a halt to the state's quasi-open primary system. Voters in 1998 approved allowing independents and voters in minor parties to vote in the Democratic or Republican primary.

There's that Republican problem with democracy and respecting the will of the voters again. Voters approved Proposition 103 in 1998 by a margin of 576,466 in favor to 375,832 against to amend the Arizona Constitution to permit minority party and no party preference voters to vote in the major party primaries. Since then, the number of voters registered "independent" or "no party" has exploded.

There are more than 929,000 unaffiliated or independent voters in the state. Want to know how fast their ranks are growing? Just since the 2008 general election, their numbers have swelled by 105,000.

On the other hand, registration in both major parties is slumping. Democrats have about 1,035,000 voters, with Republicans hovering at about 1.1 million.

Matt Roberts, a spokesman for the state Republican Party, said he hopes the lawyers and party higher-ups will decide in the next few weeks whether to mount a challenge.

"Some are concerned because they're afraid of disenfranchising independents – and that is a real concern – but in reality, what's probably more important is that the Republican primary reflects what the Republicans want," said [Pima County Republican Party] chairman Bob Westerman. "And if you're opening up that decision to people in other parties, you're not getting that."

Unlike the Arizona Republican Party, Jennifer Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Arizona Democratic Party, said her party welcomes the participation of independents.

"It sounds like the Republican purity test is coming to Arizona," Johnson said, in reference to a national push by conservative activists to withhold money from candidates who don't answer correctly on a list of policy positions, from gay marriage to opposing government-run healthcare.

Sarah Roads, a small-business owner, likewise has been an independent most of her adult life, enjoying the flexibility of crossing party lines to vote for people and issues. She said it would be detrimental to the democratic process to disenfranchise a growing bloc of voters. "And it could backfire. We could just end up going to the other side."

The Arizona Republican Party may as well borrow a sign from the old segregated South: "We do not serve Independent voters." Independent voters have become yet another "undesirable" minority not welcome within the GOP.

The time has come for the GOP to fade away into history with the Whigs and the Know Nothing Party that preceded it.

NB: The question of closed party primaries is a legitimate legal issue (as opposed to being politically tone-deaf in this day and age).

In 1996, California adopted a "blanket" primary system by initiative. (An independent or no party preference voter could vote for candidates of any political party in the primary.) The California law was challenged in federal court by the major and minor political party organizations in that state. The U. S. Supreme Court reversed the lower court rulings and declared the blanket primary invalid in California. California Democratic Party v. Jones (2000). California Democratic Party, et al. v. Jones, Bill, CA Secy of State (06/26/2000)

A political party is a private association. Under the First Amendment of the U. S. Constitution, such an association has the right to determine which persons may belong to that association and which persons may participate in the conduct of the affairs of that association. For a political party, the nomination of candidates to partisan offices is a fundamental activity of that organization. The decision in Jones establishes that a political party has a right, protected by the federal Constitution, to determine which voters may participate in the nomination of the candidates of that party for public office.

In 2007, the Arizona Libertarian Party successfully argued that Arizona's semi-open primary system is unconstitutional with respect to the Arizona Libertarian Party. http://www.ballot-access.org/2007/ALP-order-win.pdf The U.S. District Court narrowly tailored its opinion because the Arizona Republican Party and the Arizona Democratic Party were not parties to the lawsuit.

Should a major political party, i.e., the Arizona Republican Party, challenge the constitutionality of Proposition 103 (1998), the court will be confronted with striking down the law in general application. A political party still may decide whether or not to permit Independents or no party preference voters to vote in its party primary.