“Nonpartisan” Is a Ballot Rule, Not a Blank Mind

by Michael J Badagliacco, "MJB"

We keep hearing, this election season, that the city is supposed to be “nonpartisan.” Worth asking what the word is doing.

Merriam-Webster defines it as not partisan, especially free from party affiliation, bias, or designation. That is a wide word. The Charter uses a narrow slice of it.

What the Charter actually says

Article III, Section 5 says all special and general municipal elections for elective office of the City shall be nonpartisan. Elections for office. No party label next to a council candidate’s name. The City does not ask for an affiliation, and it does not print one.

That is a ballot rule. It is not an order to check your judgment at the door of the Council Chambers. It does not turn a charter question into a candidate race. And it does not require anyone or organization in town to pretend they have no point of view.

A point of view is not a defect

There will always be a lean, whoever is sitting up there. You cannot peel a person’s values off and set them on a chair. Those values are part of who they are. They show up in a vote, and in the policies a person thinks are right for the city. We do not run partisan elections for council, and nobody walks in empty, either.  There will always be a bias.

The groups that wear the label

I went back and read a few organizations that advertise the word, because the claim was not matching the work.

The League of Women Voters’ own rule is that the League shall not support or oppose any political party or any candidate. Fair enough. They also call themselves a political organization that, after study, advocates for or against policies: voting rules, redistricting, money in politics, health care, the environment, immigration. This summer the League of Women Voters of the Uncompahgre Valley wrote, as a nonpartisan group, asking the county to review the city’s proposed charter amendments.

Common Cause says the same thing in plainer language. Asked if it endorses candidates, the answer on its own page is “Never.” It still lobbies on campaign money, voting laws, and ethics, and it takes positions on ballot measures.

The ACLU is a nonpartisan organization and does not endorse candidates. It also litigates and lobbies, and it publishes what it wants candidates to believe on abortion, immigration, speech, and policing.

Closer to home, the Colorado Municipal League calls itself a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization. It adopts a policy statement and lobbies the Legislature for cities and towns, including against state preemption.

To be fair, none of that is illegal, and none of it is my complaint about their right to speak. A civic group can study an issue and take a side. The confusion is the label. In their own papers, nonpartisan means they do not endorse a party or a candidate. It does not mean they have no position. Once you see that, the word stops working as a claim of neutrality.

The high ground

Colleagues of mine have been told to set our ideology aside, usually by people who simply do not share it. Those same people have no trouble pressing their own view, and they do it from what they treat as the high ground, because they have called themselves nonpartisan.

I am sure most of them mean well. They are not unbiased. Nobody in this argument is. The label does not remove the lean. It asks the rest of us to pretend it has.

Say what you think

When a Democrat or a Republican supports a position, that is ordinary. I have never liked a straight ticket pulled without reading. If you have not looked at the question and the person, that is lazy. Do the homework.

The honest part is saying what you think and why. Used as proof that one side has risen above the fight, the badge is a way to wear the referee’s shirt while still playing.

Have the coffee

Go back thirty years. Cutting off a family member over a party would have sounded silly in most houses I knew. I have family and friends who do not share my politics. Political disagreement knocks ideas around. It should not exile a cousin. Some of what the other side argues makes me uneasy. I still want the conversation. That is where the better ideas usually show up.

Have a cup of coffee, or a meal, with someone you would normally skip because of politics. You may not leave converted. You may understand one thing you had ignored previously. Look for the common ground as Americans, as Coloradans, and as people in Montrose, without pretending the differences are not there.

The Charter keeps party labels off a council ballot. It does not keep a mind off a person.

Say what you believe. Let the other person say what they believe. Then vote.