The Independent View: The Coalition for a New Colorado Election System

A group of Colorado activists called The Coalition for a New Colorado Election System announced that it has begun collecting signatures for a new approach to election reform.

The Coalition’s proposal weaves together two interdependent changes. The first is the adoption of the “nonpartisan blanket primary” used in states that elect officeholders under a Top Two model. That means that there will be a single preliminary election in which all candidates seeking office run against each other irrespective of political party. Each voter has exactly one vote to help decide which candidates will advance to the general election.

Where this proposal differs from Top Two is that instead of only the two candidates with the most votes advancing to the general election, the general election will feature all candidates who get at least 3% of the vote, and always at least three candidates (provided no candidates wins a majority of the vote in the first round). Because more than two candidates will appear on the general election ballot, the general election always will use ranked choice voting to ensure that a weak candidate does not win election just because two or more stronger candidates split the vote between them.

The Coalition’s proposal does have several unique elements. For one, it advances more than four candidates any time more than four candidates get at least 3% of the vote each, a fairly common occurrence in high profile races. While allowing only three rankings in such elections is still much better than a traditional plurality voting elections, it is not ideal. The Coalition also has only one candidate advance if that candidate receives at least 50% in the preliminary election, a change that may conflicts with federal law, based on the Foster v. Love case involving Louisiana’s prior system. Finally, the inclusion of presidential elections would have been easier if simply adding RCV to the general election ballot and allowing the nomination process to proceed as it does under current law.

Nonetheless, this campaign represents a real step forward in how reformers think about primary election reform. Publicly funded primaries should not exclude blocs of voters based on their partisan preferences, but Top Two opens up the primaries at the cost of closing off the general election in many important races. General elections matter, and it is great to see that Colorado is considering a proposal that will open both the primaries and the general elections. I hope reformers in that state will get involved in the Coalition’s campaign.