“Nuclear Options” for Political Reform

In the wake of the recent embarrassingly political, 4-3 partisan decision by the Illinois  Supreme Court Democratic majority to reject a proposed voter initiative to reduce legislative  district gerrymandering, savvy political observer Rich Miller has suggested the “nuclear option”  of a voter initiative that would simply abolish the Illinois House altogether! The idea is not so outlandish as one might think at first blush. 

First, such a voter initiative would be constitutional, that is, it would meet the state high  court’s wrong-headed requirement that initiatives be both “structural and procedural.”  Second, many democratic governments operate quite nicely with unicameral legislative  bodies. Readers probably know that Nebraska has a one-house legislature, which they call the  senate. [And that state appears to have avoided the dysfunction for which Illinois has become  noted.] 

Costa Rica is probably the healthiest democratic society in the Americas south of the  U.S., other than maybe Uruguay. When I was that sunny clime some years ago, I visited their  unicameral “assembly.” And the 30 states of Mexico also operate with unicameral legislatures. 

I think Rich Miller had in mind that an effort to put such a proposal on the ballot might  spur the Illinois General Assembly itself to enact redistricting reform, to stave off the abolition  effort. 

I believe the idea has merit on its own, at least for further consideration.

Another major idea that would assuredly pass constitutional muster with the court is to  reinstitute cumulative voting for election to the Illinois House. 

When I was a young legislator, members to the Illinois House were elected from three member districts. Each voter had three votes to cast for candidates in a district, and voters could  “cumulate” their votes, that is, cast all three votes for one candidate. 

This voting scheme was put into the Illinois Constitution of 1870 by Chicago Tribune publisher and delegate Joseph Medill, who saw it as a way of ensuring that the minority party  would be represented in each district. 

So in my predominantly Republican district, the Democrats always elected one House  member by cumulating their votes behind him (mostly “hims” then). 

The minority representation system had the benefit of putting suburban Democrats (often  very effective ones) into that party’s caucus, and Chicago Republicans into the GOP caucus, then dominated by downstaters.  

A kind of cross-fertilization resulted, which moderated the positions of both caucuses and  also reduced, certainly didn’t eliminate, the power of the Speaker.  

For example, suburban House Democrats felt a bit more independent of the Speaker,  confident they could be re-elected with their staunch local Democratic supporters, even if the  Speaker came in and tried to beat them because of apostasy. 

A proposal to reinstate cumulative voting would also have to be found constitutional by  the state high court, because it would be the exact obverse of the proposal that made it to the  ballot in 1980 and eliminated cumulative voting. 

In 1980, populist and later governor Pat Quinn convinced voters that elimination of  cumulative voting and reduction in the size of the legislature (both were in the same proposition) would save money—and send a message to the lawmakers who had earlier given themselves a  post-election pay raise. 

I firmly believe most voters supported the Quinn “Cutback Amendment” because of their  desire the get back at lawmakers, not because they wanted to eliminate cumulative voting. Cumulative voting wasn’t perfect; no voting scheme is.  

In practice, as the minority party often had no chance of electing more than one of the  three, the party would only nominate one, rather than the two or three it could nominate. This resulted in fall elections in which voters often had only three choices on the ballot in  their district—for three positions! 

Yet today, with legislative gerrymandering of voters into districts that lean heavily to one  party or the other (protecting incumbents), there is probably even less competition in the fall than  there was under cumulative voting. 

The flaw in the old system could be addressed, to some extent, by requiring parties to put  at least two candidates on the ballot.  

In sum, I think cumulative voting had virtues that make it highly preferable to what we  have today. 

Because the state high court has in effect nullified our constitution’s proviso that voters  be given a chance to change the legislative branch of government, a nuclear option should be  considered. 

[As an aside, I hope the four Democrat justices on the Illinois Supreme Court feel  ashamed of themselves for hiding behind picayunish, hair-splitting reasoning that will deny  voters the chance to reform the almost anti-democratic gerrymandering of the present. And for  badly tarnishing the credibility of a state court we would like to hold in high esteem, but can’t.]