[14737] in APO-L
Re: National convention committee system
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Joseph M. Fisher)
Fri Jul 12 18:38:07 1996
Date: Fri, 12 Jul 1996 18:33:09 -0900
Reply-To: "Joseph M. Fisher" <jfisher@RacerX.mse.jhu.edu>
From: "Joseph M. Fisher" <jfisher@RacerX.mse.jhu.edu>
To: Multiple recipients of list APO-L <APO-L@VM.CC.PURDUE.EDU>
In-Reply-To: <9607120228.AA15292@RacerX.mse.jhu.edu>
On Thu, 11 Jul 1996, John T Kohl wrote:
> Now, in the particular case of Time and Place, things tend to get messy
> since it's often an issue for which emotions and loyalties run high, and
> many delegates don't want their chosen side to lose. (Likewise with
> other contentious issues). For less-contentious issues, e.g. service
> program of emphasis, delegates are rarely as upset with committee
> recommendations.
I agree... there's always going to be somebody unhappy with the decision
made. But the problem I see is that we don't have the same kind of
choice when we're voting on the convention site that we have when we're
voting on another controversial issue - the Toast Song, for example.
A typical piece of legislation is completely elastic. We can do with it
whatever we want. Amend it, amend an amendment, strike sections... or
totally ignore it. The Toast Song proposal changed multiple times even
after it got to the floor.
Selecting the convention site, on the other hand, has a limited outcome
and a definite set of candidates. In Dallas we had four. We HAD to vote
for one of them. There couldn't be a compromise, as was attempted on the
Toast Song. That is why I question the procedure - because the
legislative process is designed to achieve compromise, and operates under
the assumption that compromise is possible.
We have the option of conducting the site selection as an election, as we
do for the candidates to national office. But we couldn't do the voting in
quite the same way. When we're picking the National President, the
vote is kept secret, and nobody wins and nobody loses until someone has
50%. Obviously this isn't going to happen if there are four candidates.
One or two people need to drop out. What I'm pretty sure happens
(somebody correct me if I'm wrong here) is that the candidates are
privately told the results (which the voters DON'T know), whereupon the
bottom one or two drop out to speed things up (a little bit). If we want
to keep the vote secret, this process might not work for choosing a
convention site, because the candidates are delegations, not individuals,
and these groups would have to meet and decide whether to drop out, and
possibly also who to support.
What I'm wondering is whether we can find a middle ground between an
election process and a legislative process.
-- Cyrano
