LAWRENCE LITTLEFIELD
thanks you for voting

Notes on My Experience

I would like to thank all those who voted for me, and all those who read my flyers and website and considered doing so. I also thank Bob Conroy, Diane Whitehouse, Fran Miller and other members of the Brooklyn Independence Party for helping me to get on the ballot, and Steve Isler of the Staten Island Independence Party for posting my essays on this website. I am pleased that I was able to speak my piece and get it off my chest, and that I also gave you an opportunity to express yourself through voting. This would not have been possible without their assistance. Those who might want to run themselves should be aware that such assistance is available.

My campaign for State Assembly was, in effect, the test of a theory - that an independent or minor party candidate could get around the non-aggression pacts that entrench incumbents, the dominance of certain interests, and party-line loyalties, by reaching out to individuals. Given the relatively small number of votes I received, compared with the number of people I interacted with, this theory has apparently been proved false, at least for now. I do not have a replacement theory at this time, but hope that someone will come up with one and try again. It is necessary and important. People have to keep trying.

The current situation is this. The State of New York has enacted, and continues to enact, a series of policies that benefit members of organized, politically active interests at the expense of the majority, and the future. These policies tend to pass the state legislature unanimously, or close to it, thus demonstrating that neither major party provides an alternative to them. Since many of the policies sacrifice the future, which continues to arrive, the number of beneficiaries continues to fall relative to the number of victims. In theory, therefore, the majority should eventually vote the incumbents out and put a stop to it. That's democracy.

Against this, we have institutional barriers to challenges to incumbents. Republicans or Democrats predominate over large geographic areas, and gerrymandering is used to create even more "safe seats" that the other major party is unable to contest. Competition between the two major parties, therefore, is limited to nationwide, statewide and citywide races, and a few swing districts.

Factions within the parties no longer contest primaries either, since the interests that dominate them back the incumbents as long as their privileges are maintained. The outrage that greeted Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi's decision to back a primary challenge to an incumbent Democrat shows how strong the non-aggression pact within the major parties is. I'm told that there was once an "independent" "reform" movement within New York City's Democratic Party, but that it petered out long ago, and no longer runs candidates against non-reform incumbents.

So neither a challenge from the other major party, nor a challenge within one of the parties in a primary, has much of a chance of succeeding if there is an incumbent. The only real elections are for open seats, and even these are decided in primaries, in which only a small minority of people vote.

I had hoped to prove that a challenge by an independent or minor party candidate, in the general election when everyone shows up, could be a way to create real competition for office. Regardless of the strength or weakness of my individual appeal as a candidate, and of the incumbent I ran against, I should have attracted more votes if this theory was correct. The simple desire for change in an ossified system ought to have been enough to attract the 5,000 or so votes that I had hoped to receive, if a large share of people were really open to such challengers. Had I received that many votes or something close to it, I would have claimed that someone with more political ability than I might have been able to actually threaten an incumbent. That is, if I could get 5,000, a "real" politician with real political ability may have been able to get 51 percent against an incumbent, and such prospective politicians should run rather than continuing to wait around for someone to die or be convicted.

As it is, honesty requires that I see the vote totals for what they are. The vote I received (just under 1,000) is small relative to the number of flyers I handed out (18,300). It is also low given the number of people in the area who know and respect me personally, and the number I spoke with at length and in detail over three months, or corresponded with by e-mail. These three categories alone, along with those who vote "Independent" as reflexively as other vote "Republican" or "Democrat," could account for the vast majority of the votes I received, leaving the rest of the flyers unread or forgotten. If the majority of my votes turn out to be in my own neighborhood, this would be confirmed. Moreover, the number of votes I received is just about what politically knowledgeable people had predicted, given the factors above. So is the percentage, allowing for the higher number of Democratic voters due to Presidential turnout.

I had hoped that without a Republican or Democratic label, people would be less likely to make assumptions about what I had to say, and thus more would be willing to find out what that in fact was. The evidence suggests, however, that open-minded and interested people, those reading this message, are members of small minority. Most people, it appears, simply vote for members of the majority party they favor, based on factors independent of the public policies that affect their lives. This is reinforced by the media, which does not bother to cover challengers in general unless there is a swing district or an open seat. I don't think the message was rejected, since the vast majority of people I came across a second time who said they had read the flyer said they agreed. Rather, the message was ignored by the uninterested majority.

The financial advantages of incumbency had nothing to do with these election results, since the incumbent did not campaign and I most likely outspent him, even given the limited amount I spent. Name recognition may not have been much of a factor either, since a relatively small share of people I had a chance to speak with at length (especially among those under, say, 45) had heard of him, or any other state legislator. Moreover, I received fewer votes than a Republican challenger did two years ago, a challenger who also did not bother to campaign. So the advantage of being able to appeal directly to voters, with my point of view (which doesn't fit either major party), is apparently less valuable than having at least some people automatically vote for you because of your major party line. But such a line will also cause other people to automatically vote against you. The dilemma remains unsolved.

In the past general elections, a large share of those who voted for the major contested offices (President, Governor, Mayor) didn't even bother to vote for State Assembly in this district. I had thought this could be because there wasn't an alternative, and that (at least if I handed them a flyer in person) they might vote for one if available. Based on the vote data I have seen so far, however, it appears that most people who did not want to vote for the incumbent just didn't bother voting for Assembly, rather than voting for me or the other challenger in the race. In a sense, I and the other challenger may have been defeated not only by the incumbent and the majority party but also by "who cares?", and by a substantial margin. And that's among those who cared enough to show up and vote for President.

Unfortunately, my experience is not just my experience. As bad as things are up there, virtually all the incumbents were returned to Albany, aside from (perhaps) a couple of party switchers in some of the few districts that are competitive between the major parties. And while Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno would surely be voted out in a statewide election given any alternative at all, they are able to hide behind the majority in the conferences, and are thus unassailable. The City of New York has term limits to create open seats, and thus real elections, every eight years. But the State of New York does not, and it is unlikely to say the least that the legislators will eliminate their own permanent sinecures by enacting them.

The situation is apparently similar to corporate governance. Top executives and directors may be enriching themselves, diluting ownership with stock issues and options, and bankrupting the company, but electoral rules make it impossible to vote them out. It is easier just to sell the stock. Similarly, for many New Yorkers, especially those Upstate, it is easier to move out than to try to change things. That's what many people tell me - the only options are to take what you get, or to move to New Jersey. Unfortunately New York City is a unique environment, and those who want to live the way you can in Brooklyn, walking and taking transit and getting to know your neighbors, don't have many real alternatives. The only check on self-dealing appears to be bankruptcy, as New York City experienced in the 1970s, and the courts, which (despite being beholden to the same political system as the legislators) seem to be willing to limit the level of victimization every now and then.

Is there another way forward? What now?

At this point, I don't see much hope for renewal from within the Democrats, especially at the state level, despite their ongoing defeats for President, Congress, and even the Mayor of New York City. So dominated are they by long term incumbents, and interests that benefit from existing arrangements, that they have less and less left to offer anyone else, even in New York where they are given the highest state and local taxes (as a share of income) in the country. So the Democrats have been playing prevent defense for 30 years, gradually sacrificing the interests of their most loyal voters to appeal to swing voters and slow the decline. The greater their decline, the greater the determination to circle the wagons and rely on inertia, rather than risking upsetting the applecart by challenging entrenched interests and officials from within.

The stagnation goes right to the top of the ticket. In the Presidential election, you were either for the Bush agenda or against it; Kerry was a challenger who had little to offer other than less change. Leading "liberal" newspapers and magazines are similarly conservative. Nationally, I'd like to see a Democratic equivalent of the 1994 Republican "Contract for America" in 2006, and a real challenge for Congress, but do not expect it, because the Democrats are too brain dead. Among New York's Democrats, only Nassau County Executive Suozzi - who not coincidently had to push his way to his current prominence in a Republican-dominated county - is willing to push for change.

The Republicans, for their part, seem even less capable of introspection. After all, at the national level they are winning. Moreover, while the Democrats tend to sacrifice their loyal supporters to reward interest groups and appeal to swing voters, Republicans also like to sacrifice loyally Democratic people and places - and the future -- to reward their own. This limits their appeal to those in New York City and to younger generations, to say the least. But the greater their majority, and the more concentrated the opposition, the less they have to worry about sticking to principles (of any sort) to appeal to more Americans. Their rot is more recent, but it is accelerating rapidly as more and more deals get done, as thoughtful Republicans are aware.

Until I come up with a new idea, or identify someone else who has one, I can only offer the following advice. If you are a registered Democrat and Suozzi decides to run for Governor in 2006, get to the polls on primary day and vote for him. If he decides to run other candidates against incumbent legislators in New York City, vote for them also. If someone else decides, despite the odds, to do their civic duty, speak their piece, and run against an incumbent legislator in a primary or general election, give them your attention and consideration, regardless of party label. We owe them that reward.

And, given that most children in New York City did not receive a publicly-financed "sound basic education" over the past 30 years, and that most of those now under 50 will receive radically less extensive public benefits in old age despite paying more for them, if those now in power insist on piling up debts on us besides, they ought to consider the possibility that at some point my generation, and those following, will simply refuse to pay the money back. That's right, not pay it back, and if things get bad enough, perhaps not pay public pension obligations and throw in an occasional general strike besides. You never know where the political appeal of something for nothing, indifference to civil society, and opportunism in a value-free environment, will lead. I advise against holding long term debt issued by governments with diminishing claims on our loyalty, led by cynical politicians who lack the moral authority to ask for any sacrifices for any purpose from anyone who matters, even in a time of war.

- Larry Littlefield

Please click on these essays for more information: Civic Union 2020 Unforgivable Policies of the State of New York How the State Legislature Could and Should Work Equal Protection -       A Much Neglected Criterion for Decent Government and an Ethical Society       Other links: The Brennan Center's report on the New York State legislature (pdf file) Fix Albany - Tom Suozzi's site My research on New York State's taxes, debt and employment for the Taub Urban Research Center at NYU. Send e-mail to me at vampire-state@att.net

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Most recent update: November 5, 2004.