Today the extra votes may superficially seem to benefit us as Latinos, but tomorrow a ruling on another issue could easily cut against us. The right to vote is one of our most cherished rights. To have it diluted and restricted for some is an affront to the equal opportunities our nation provides.
Phoenix, AZ – ALRA Chairman, Jesse Hernandez, commented on the recent federal court decision of the State of New York. "On behalf of ALRA, we are appalled at the gigantic step backwards a New York federal court and the New York suburb of Port Chester have taken in regards to race relations and voting rights. They have chosen to give Latino residents six votes instead of one in an election for village trustees. As a nation, we have made great strides from the days when blacks were only considered 3/5 of a person. That unfair treatment was rightly reversed by the 14th and 15th Amendments. It is equally wrong now to give one race or ethnicity additional votes, regardless of the motive. It has the same effect; unfairly reducing the vote of those who are not Latino.
The United States is no longer the land of Jim Crowe. It is unlikely the reason there aren't any Latinos on the village council is due to racism. It is more likely there aren't any because none chose to run for office. Almost half of the village population is Latino, but many are too young to vote or are there illegally and therefore disenabling to participate in a legal voting process. If people are concerned there are not enough Latinos as village trustees, they should recruit Latinos using their private resources, not the heavy hand of government.
Even so, we would hope that people would select their leaders based on whether they are the best candidate for the office, not the color of their skin. Martin Luther King, Jr., famously said in his 'I Have a Dream Speech', that he had a dream that his four little children would one day live in a nation where they would not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.
Today the extra votes may superficially seem to benefit us as Latinos, but tomorrow a ruling on another issue could easily cut against us. The right to vote is one of our most cherished rights. To have it diluted and restricted for some is an affront to the equal opportunities our nation provides. This is a slippery slope we do not want to go down. We strongly denounce this court decision and its negative effect on the foundation of our political system."
For media inquiries, please email feedback//at//intellectualconservative.com and we will put you in touch with the ALRA spokesperson.
Gee; what a suprise. The only amazing thing about this is it happened in New York before it happened in California
“As a nation, we have made great strides from the days when blacks were only permitted 3/5 of a vote.”
Whaaaaat? This is not true and leads to an erroneous conclusion. First off, slaves were not allowed to vote in any event. Slaves were counted as 3/5 of a person for the sole purpose of allocating the number of representatives of slave states in the House of Representatives. Southern states wanted to count them as whole persons so as to increase Southern representation; the North didn’t want to count them at all. In fact, it would have been to the slaves’ long-term best interest not to have been counted at all. The 3/5 was a compromise. And there never was “3/5 of a vote”.
As far as this beating California, it doesn’t. I voted in many elections in Ca between 1962 and 2002 and saw many ballots on which there were numerous candidates for local offices, and with instructions that said, for example, “Vote for no more than six candidates”, because there were six offices to be filled. My understanding is this NY district elects its representatives at large, so it would not be unusual for each voter to have six votes for six offices.
Unless the New York case allows only Hispanics this option and not other citizens, or allows only them to allocate more than one vote per candidate, I don’t see what’s so unusual or wrong about it.
The article has been changed from “3/5 of a vote” to “3/5 of a person”, so I am modifying my post to eliminate my paragraph addressing it:
This decision by a judge doesn’t beat California. I voted in many elections in Ca between 1962 and 2002 and saw many ballots on which there were numerous candidates for local offices, and with instructions that said, for example, “Vote for no more than six candidates”, because there were six offices to be filled. My understanding is this NY district elects its representatives at large, so it would not be unusual for each voter to have six votes for six offices.
Unless the New York case allows only Hispanics this option and not other citizens, or allows only them to allocate more than one vote per candidate, I don’t see what’s so unusual or wrong about it.
Hey guys this was just an exercise in cumulative voting which gave every voter the same privileges. For example if there were 6 people running for city council each voter was allowed to distribute their 6 votes in any way they wished. Not a bad idea from my perspective since I usually advocate voting for only one or two in a vote for 6 situation. Why? Acts somewhat like cumulative voting by allowing me to give a vote to the one I really want to elect and deny votes to all of the others. Voting for 6 provides votes for 5 others that I may not want to support.
The problem of vote for x number ballots is that it gives the alsorans votes every time people vote for x rather than something less than x.
Sedonaman, I forgot to mention that Port Chester did allow all 6 to be cast for one person. That is why I like cumulative voting better than the alternative I have used when running for office (and being elected) in the past. Only works in those cases where candidates are running at large for a number of seats. Voting only for the one you like is not as strong as cumulative voting but it is an effective strategy when you are attempting to elect specific people to office.
Mickey G:
If Port Chester’s method is similar to the one my homeowners association used, it could lead to a result that [in this case] blacks won’t like. They run the risk of giving all their votes to one candidate who doesn’t need that many to win, while abandoning other candidates to the whim of a relatively few white voters. IOW, they would waste a lot of votes that could have gone to other candidates sympathetic to their side of the issues.
If I recall correctly, Newt Gingrich won his congressional seat because Georgia formed a district composed of almost all black voters so they could elect one black candidate. In the end, they got their wish but in the process sucked away voters who would have supported Democrats in other districts. And that was a one-man/one-vote election.
What they should adopt instead is, “One man, one vote for one office.”
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