The Ballot Bulletin: January 2018

• Redistricting
  • State-by-state redistricting procedures
  • Gerrymandering
• Voting policy
  • Voter identification laws by state
  • Automatic voter registration
  • Early voting
  • Absentee voting
  • Online voter registration
• Ballot access
  • Ballot access for presidential candidates
  • Ballot access for major and minor party candidates
  • List of political parties in the United States

Stay on top of election policy news throughout the states

Email *

First Name

Please complete the Captcha above

In The Ballot Bulletin, Ballotpedia tracks developments in election policy at the federal, state, and local levels. To shed light on these developments, each issue will include an in-depth feature, such as an interview or event timeline. We will also discuss recent prominent events relating to electoral and primary systems, redistricting, and voter provisions.

This month's edition: This month, we will bring up-to-speed on recent developments surrounding the implementation of ranked-choice voting (RCV) in Santa Fe, New Mexico. We'll also get you caught up on Benisek v. Lamone, a case involving alleged partisan gerrymandering in Maryland that the Supreme Court has agreed to hear. Finally, we'll take a moment to look back on legislative activity involving election policy in 2017 (and we'll give you a glimpse of what election policy ballot measures may make the ballot in 2018).

Santa Fe City Council votes to adopt procedures for ranked-choice voting in municipal elections

See also: Electoral systems in New Mexico

• What's the story? On December 20, 2017, the Santa Fe City Council voted unanimously to adopt an ordinance establishing procedures for ranked-choice voting (RCV) in the city. Under the ordinance, a majority will be defined as 50 percent plus one of all votes cast for candidates who have not been eliminated in earlier rounds of voting (as opposed to a majority of all votes cast). The council also approved two separate ballot designs, one organized horizontally and one organized vertically; the vertical ballot design was adopted in the event that the horizontal design proves incompatible with existing voting software. A voter education website (accessible here) was launched on December 21, 2017.
  • What is RCV? A ranked choice voting system (RCV) is an electoral system in which voters rank candidates by preference on their ballots. If a candidate wins a majority of first-preference votes, he or she is declared the winner. If no candidate wins a majority of first-preference votes, the candidate with the fewest first-preference votes is eliminated. First-preference votes cast for the failed candidate are eliminated, lifting the second-preference choices indicated on those ballots. A new tally is conducted to determine whether any candidate has won a majority of the adjusted votes. The process is repeated until a candidate wins an outright majority. This system is sometimes referred to as an instant runoff voting system. To learn more, click here.
• What brought us here? Santa Fe citizens adopted RCV for municipal elections via a 2008 city charter amendment. The amendment language provided for implementation of RCV beginning in 2010 "or as soon thereafter as equipment and software for tabulation of votes and the ability to correct incorrectly marked, in-person ballots, is available at a reasonable price." On August 30, 2017, a group of New Mexico residents filed suit in the New Mexico Supreme Court against the Santa Fe City Council and mayor, requesting that the court order city officials to implement RCV in the 2018 municipal election cycle. On September 21, 2017, the state supreme court denied this request. The plaintiffs re-filed their suit in state court on September 29, 2017. On November 29, 2017, state Judge David Thomson ordered city officials to implement RCV in the 2018 municipal election cycle. On December 4, 2017, the Santa Fe City Council voted unanimously to implement RCV in the city's March 2018 municipal elections, complying with Thomson's November 29 order.
• What are the reactions and what comes next?
  • At the conclusion of the city council's meeting on December 21, Councilor Joseph Maestas said, "I'm tired, but I feel really good about what we've done." Councilor Peter Ives said, "We seem to have our hands tied a bit here. For those folks who have said, 'Oh, this is such an easy thing,' I wish I agreed with you."
  • City spokesman Matt Ross described the city's voter education efforts as follows: "The goal is every voter knows when to vote, where to vote, and how to vote. Every voter that's interested in learning about the more in-depth process of how the votes are calculated and counted will have access to that information as well. But our main focus is making sure people understand how to fill out the ballot and how to vote correctly."
  • At its December 4 meeting, at which the city council voted unanimously to implement RCV, the council also voted 5-4 to appeal Thomson's implementation order to the state supreme court. The city's appeal pivots on two questions: whether the state judge who issued the implementation order acted outside his authority, and whether RCV is in compliance with the state constitution.
• What is the history of RCV? In 1915, Ashtabula, Ohio, became the first jurisdiction in the United States to use RCV. Between 1915 and 1948, 24 cities in 11 different states (California, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Tennessee, and West Virginia) adopted RCV for some municipal elections. However, by 1962, all but one of these cities (Cambridge, Massachusetts) had repealed RCV. In the United States, the idea achieved renewed prominence in the first years of the 21st century. At present, 10 cities in six states (California, Colorado, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, and Minnesota) use RCV for some municipal elections. Another 10 jurisdictions (including nine cities and one state, Maine) are poised to begin using RCV in the future.
• What are the arguments for and against RCV? Proponents argue that, because voters can register their relative preference for multiple candidates instead of a single candidate, RCV ensures that only candidates with broad support among their constituents are elected (i.e., candidates campaign not just for first-preference votes, but also for second-preference, third-preference, etc.). Proponents also argue that this can result in the election of more moderate candidates. Opponents argue that the process RCV does not necessarily produce more moderate elected officials or substantially different outcomes than traditional plurality voting systems. Opponents also argue that RCV can cause voter confusion and create situations in which a candidate wins the election without winning a plurality of first-preference votes. For more detailed information on the arguments for and against RCV, see this article.
• What's going on in the rest of the country?
  • Maine RCV update: Maine RCV update: On December 19, 2017, the Committee for Ranked Choice Voting reported that it had collected roughly two-thirds of the required signatures to force a veto referendum against a bill (LD 1646) that delays the implementation of RCV in Maine until December 2021 and automatically repeals RCV if a state constitutional amendment to enable it is not approved by that time. If petitioners succeed in collecting the required 61,123 valid signatures by February 2, 2018, LD 1646 will be suspended until voters decide whether to uphold it or reject it at the June 2018 election. To learn more about the status of RCV in Maine, see this article.
  • The map below identifies states in which electoral systems or primary systems legislation has been introduced in 2018. A darker shade of red indicates a greater number of relevant bills. For full details about electoral systems legislation, see this article. For full details about primary systems legislation, see this article.

Electoral systems legislation as of January 1, 2018

Primary systems legislation as of January 1, 2018

Supreme Court agrees to hear Benisek v. Lamone, a partisan gerrymandering case originating in Maryland

See also: Redistricting in Maryland

• What's the story? On December 8, 2017, the Supreme Court of the United States announced that it would hear 'Benisek v. Lamone', a case involving alleged partisan gerrymandering in Maryland. Seven Maryland Republicans, all of whom lived and voted in Maryland's Sixth Congressional District prior to its reconfiguration in the 2010 redistricting cycle, claim that state lawmakers altered the boundaries of the Sixth District in order to dilute the impact of Republican votes. They allege that this action was deliberate and effective, constituting a violation of their First Amendment right to protection from official retaliation for political beliefs
  • What's the political context? In 2010, the last election that took place using the district maps adopted following the 2000 United States Census, Republican Roscoe Bartlett won the U.S. House election for Maryland's Sixth District with 61.4 percent of the vote. In 2012, the first election that took place using the maps adopted following the 2010 census, Bartlett won 37.9 percent of the vote, losing his seat to Democrat John Delaney (who won with 58.8 percent of the vote).
• What brought us here? The district plan in question was adopted in 2011 and was affirmed via referendum in 2012. On November 5, 2013, the plan's opponents filed suit in district court alleging an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander and requesting that a three-judge panel be convened to hear the case. Federal Judge James Bredar rejected the plaintiffs' claim. The United States Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit affirmed Bredar's decision on November 12, 2014. On February 10, 2015, the case was appealed to the Supreme Court of the United States, which agreed to hear the case. On December 8, 2015, the high court ruled unanimously in favor of the plan's opponents, finding that a three-judge panel must be convened to hear the case. That panel was convened in February 2017, and on August 24, 2017, it voted 2-1 to deny the request for an injunction against the maps.
• What are the reactions and what comes next?
  • In a jurisdictional statement filed with the Supreme Court on September 1, 2017, attorneys for the Republicans involved in the lawsuit said the following: "The record here shows that Governor Martin O'Malley and other top state officials specifically intended to dilute the votes of Republicans in the State's Sixth Congressional District because of those citizens' support for Republican Roscoe Bartlett, the district's representative for the preceding 20 years. To that end, the mapdrawers reshuffled fully half of the district’s 720,000 residents—far more than necessary to correct the mere 10,000-person imbalance in the district’s population following the 2010 census. The net result of this fundamental reconfiguration of the district’s lines was a more than 90,000-voter swing in favor of Democrats, after which registered Republicans’ share of the electorate fell from 47% to just 33%."
  • In a motion to affirm the decision of the three-judge panel filed with the Supreme Court on October 31, 2017, attorneys for Maryland wrote the following: "The district court stated it was 'not yet persuaded' that plaintiffs are likely to succeed in carrying their burden of proving that it was the alleged 'gerrymander (versus a host of forces present in every election) that flipped the Sixth District, and, more importantly, that will continue to control the electoral outcomes in that district.' The majority deemed this showing of causation indispensable because, 'if an election result is not engineered through a gerrymander but is instead the result of neutral forces and voter choice, then no injury has occurred.' That is, '[i]f the loss is instead a consequence of voter choice, that is not an injury. It is democracy.'"
  • Benisek v. Lamone is the second case involving allegations of partisan gerrymandering that the Supreme Court will hear in its current term. The other is Gill v. Whitford, a case involving state legislative districts in Wisconsin; that case was brought by a group of state Democrats.
• What has SCOTUS said in the past on the question of partisan gerrymandering? The phrase partisan gerrymandering refers to the practice of drawing electoral district maps with the intention of favoring one political party over another. In contrast with racial gerrymandering, on which the Supreme Court has issued rulings in the past affirming that such practices violate federal law, the high court has never issued a ruling establishing clear precedent on the question of partisan gerrymandering. According to The Wall Street Journal in an article discussing Gill v. Whitford, "Some Supreme Court justices have previously expressed concern about partisan gerrymandering, but a majority of the court has been hesitant to intervene so directly in the American political process and to say how much partisanship is too much." Robert Barnes, writing on June 19, 2017, for The Washington Post, made a similar observation: "[The] Supreme Court has long been tolerant of partisan gerrymandering – and some justices have thought that the court shouldn't even be involved."
• What's going on in the rest of the country? The map below identifies states in which redistricting legislation has been introduced in 2018. A darker shade of red indicates a greater number of relevant bills. For full details about redistricting legislation, see this article.

Redistricting legislation as of January 1, 2018

2017 legislation round-up (and 2018 ballot measure preview)

With 2017 behind us the 2018 midterms fast approaching, we wanted to take a moment to look back on legislative activity involving election policy in 2017.

• Electoral systems legislation: n 2017, Ballotpedia tracked 87 bills dealing with electoral systems policy that were considered in state legislatures across the country. Of these 87 bills, five became law, an adoption rate of 5.7 percent.
• Primary systems legislation: In 2017, Ballotpedia tracked 15 bills dealing with primary election system policy that were considered in state legislatures across the country. Of these, none became law.
• Redistricting legislation: In 2017, Ballotpedia tracked 166 bills dealing with redistricting policy that were considered in state legislatures across the country. Of these 166 bills, 68 became law, an adoption rate of 41.0 percent.
  • Redistricting legislation in the U.S. Congress: Up to this point, 17 bills dealing with redistricting have been introduced during the 115th United States Congress (2017-2019). None of these have become law.
• 2018 ballot measures: Ballotpedia has tracked 19 ballot measures dealing with election policy in 2018. These are proposed measures that may or may not make the ballot. A full list of these ballot measures can be accessed here.

See also

• Election policy on Ballotpedia
• Electoral systems legislation at the state and city levels in the United States, 2018
• Primary systems legislation at the state and city levels in the United States, 2018
• Redistricting legislation at the state and city levels in the United States, 2018
• Federal redistricting legislation in the United States, 2017-2019 (115th Congress)