Ranting On... the Colorado Recalls

State Senators Angela Giron and John Morse

Tomorrow, the state of Colorado will encounter something that they have never experienced: a recall election.  While states like Wisconsin and California have experienced high-profile recalls in recent years, Colorado has stayed largely above the fray.  Since this is arguably the most important election tomorrow (the actual office of NYC Mayor is definitely more significant than a couple of State Senate seats in the Boulder State, but the Colorado elections are about actual issues, whereas the NYC race has turned into a three-ring circus), I figured we should take a look at what’s causing the recalls and recall elections in general.

The two legislators that are being recalled are State Sen. John Morse, the President of his legislative body, and newly-elected (as of 2010) State Sen. Angela Giron.  Morse, first elected in 2006, has taken off in his political career, quickly rising to President of the State Senate after several years in law enforcement.  Giron’s first elected office is her current seat, but she has worked for Sens. Ken Salazar and Michael Bennet, so she’s hardly a political neophyte.

The subject that is driving the recalls of these two senators is one that we’ve heard a lot about, but only seen action on (one way or the other) on a state-level, rather than a federal: guns and gun safety.  The principle laws that seem to be the source of the recall are a 15-round limit on ammunition magazines and universal background check requirements.  Colorado, thanks to the horrifying events in Columbine and Aurora, has been hit harder than most states by headline-grabbing gun violence, but the state also has a very strong contingent of hunters and NRA members, so these votes were not taken likely by the constituents of these two lawmakers.

I’m not going to make this entire article a debate about gun control (I’ve spoken about this at length in other articles), but I will take this chance to discuss recall elections, as this is an increasingly utilized tool, and one that I think is being badly mistreated.

For starters, I’ve never really understood the purpose of a recall election.  If a lawmaker is elected to an office, the people have chosen to give he or she the full duration of that term to finish his or her job.  With a recall, the person can be removed before they’ve had a chance to finish that job or before the term (and another election) comes to be.  Recall elections deprive a lawmaker of leeway in getting their job done (Rome wasn’t built in a day) and also gives them the confidence that they have 2, 4, 6, or whatever the duration of the term to complete their goals.  If at the end of the term, the public doesn’t like what the lawmaker did, didn’t want them there in the first place, or don’t think they’ve fulfilled their duties, we have a system of primaries and general elections to remove that person from office.

Some argue that recall elections give the public “even more democracy” (it’s like those Tide ads-now with 10% more!), but that’s simply not the case-the public actually gets less.  If lawmakers are constantly wary of making an unpopular decision, they simply won’t do so.  History is filled with subjects from the abolition of slavery to legalizing gay marriage that were not necessarily popular when the laws were enacted.  Throwing a monkey wrench where the public can instantly blackmail the politicians against voting one way gives us less room for compromise and more room for gridlock.  It also means that politicians, who are already in some state of constantly running for their next office ($20 says that there’s at least one article about 2016 on CNN.com right now), truly may have to be running for public office constantly.  And before people say that I’m only against this because it’s affecting Democrats, I’ve always had this stance, and recalls put conservative politicians at risk in their goals as well: it’s difficult to believe that if Mitch Daniels or John Kasich or Pat McCrory were in a constant state of worry about recalls that they would have enacted such tough conservative laws early in their terms, if at all.

So with the argument of why issue-based recalls are a bad idea out of the way, the only other reason to keep recalls around is if a politician has done something amoral or illegal.  Not to be cynical here, but if a politician is a philanderer, is anyone even remotely surprised anymore?  I mean, a politician having an affair is about as shocking these days as the sun rising.  If people are against he or she, then they have the next election to kick them to the curb (no one asks why you vote a certain way, and you’re not required to make your ballot box decisions based solely on the issues).  And if the politician has done something illegal, there are systems for every political office in America to remove them from office in some form of impeachment if necessary, and the legal system can then take its course.

Some people have started to come around to my way of thinking with recall elections, in particular after the 2012 gubernatorial recall of Gov. Scott Walker.  It was fairly apparent that Walker did not quite have the popularity to win that election, that his decisions were not held by the majority, and that the blue-state nature of Wisconsin gave the Democrats an upper hand in that election, but enough people didn’t feel that Walker deserved to be recalled to force the Democrats to lose.  It cannot be understated how badly the Democrats bungled that election-Walker heads into 2014 as a clear frontrunner, rather than an incumbent who has had his full four years and now the Democrats want the seat back.  The Democrats have also branded their best candidate, Rep. Tom Barrett, as a two-time loser, making it almost impossible for him to be taken seriously as a challenger.  And with Walker likely to win for a third time statewide in a blue state (as a very conservative incumbent), the Badger State Democrats have also given him a huge leg-up as a presidential challenger in 2016.  If Scott Walker becomes our 45^th president, the recall election played a major part in that journey.

This brings up point another thing I don’t understand about recalls-there’s always a next election.  Despite what people may say, every politician can be defeated if the majority of the electorate wants them out of office.  You may not like it that you’re a Democrat in Oklahoma or a Republican in Hawaii and your side never wins, but that’s the way democracy works-the person with the most votes wins.  Plus, if an incumbent truly becomes unpopular, even red states toss incumbent Republicans (Ted Stevens, anyone?) and blue states toss incumbent Democrats (Russ Feingold, anyone?).  Elections keep checks on who we choose as our elected officials, and no matter how cynical one gets, no elected official is a guarantee to win if the public decides against it.

And with this, let me make one final, tangential point about a nearby topic: term limits.  Like recall elections, term limits are sold by their supporters as giving people “more Democracy” (now with 15% more!), but in the end they give us less.  People always have the right to vote someone out of office, and if they truly want incumbents to not have inherent advantages thanks to money or franking privileges, they can always vote for people who will enact those laws (or you can run yourself).  Term limits deny the voters the right to continue having the same person serve them in office-that’s the definition of limiting democracy.  In addition to this, it deprives us of a knowledge base with seasoned legislators.  I always say (and I really do), "politics and prostitution are the only two businesses where people don't want experience."  But when someone is discussing a major issue like Syria or the federal budget, I’d quite frankly want someone who has been on the team for a while rather than someone who just won.  Term limits deprive us of choice and of our freedom to elect whomever we want, and that’s wrong.

So that’s my Monday Rant (I might have another one for our regular Friday rant), but what are your thoughts on this issue?  What do you think will happen in Colorado (I haven’t the foggiest, though demographics and past elections seem to indicate that Giron is safer than Morse)?  And since it’s also tomorrow, will Eliot Spitzer or Anthony Weiner have the most YouTubed concession speech?