THE SINGLE TRANSFERABLE VOTE
It is important also to note that the system of proportional representation adopted by all these American cities is the "single transferable vote" or "Hare system." Strangely enough, too, no other system than this single transferable vote has been adopted for public elections in any other English-speaking country, though rival systems, especially the party list system, have spread with great rapidity in recent years over continental Europe and some other parts of the world.
The chief difference, so far as political effects are concerned, between the single transferable vote and the list system is that the former gives the voter far more freedom than the latter to make his will effective even when he consults only his own real preferences without being restricted by party lines and without regard to any candi- date's supposed strength or weakness. It is this greater freedom of the voter under the single transferable vote that makes the system effective not only in giving the right number of seats in the representative body to each section of public opinion but also in freeing the voter from thralldom to political "machines."
The main principles of the single transferable vote are easily explained. The members of the representative body are elected either all together at large, as in the case of the council of a small or medium-sized city, or in districts each of which is large enough to elect several. No matter how many members are being elected in a voter's district, he has but one vote. If a sufficient number of votes - a quota, as it is called-support a candidate, he is elected. If seven are being elected together, the perfect quota would be, of course, one seventh of all who have voted.
For practical reasons, however, a slightly smaller number, namely, barely more than one eighth of all who have voted, is used as the quota. The voter expresses his vote by putting the figure 1 opposite the name of his favorite candidate. He is, however, allowed and encouraged also to express his second and lower choices by the figures 2, 3, etc. - as many or as few such lower choices as he pleases. At the voting precincts only the first choices are counted. The ballots of the entire multi-member district are brought together from the precincts to a central counting place. The count is then completed in accordance with definite rules which work out in causing each ballot to help, if possible, in the election of one candidate -- in every case the candidate marked as most desired by the voter among those candidates who could possibly be helped to election by it.
Thus each member of the body is elected by a quota of voters who are united, considering the actual alignments revealed by the ballots, in the desire to elect the candidate whom in fact they do elect. As a quota of votes is required for the election of each member - I disregard certain exceptions - no party or group can elect more members than it polls quotas of votes.
And, on the other hand, any group of voters that polls a quota of votes or more is sure to elect the member or members it deserves.
ILLUSTRATION OF POLITICAL EFFECTS
The political effects of the transferability of the vote, which are quite distinct from the proportional effects mentioned in the preceding paragraph, may be illustrated by a single example. Suppose seven councilmen were being elected together, and suppose each voter had only one vote and it was not transferable.
In that case a poitical party which expected to poll three-sevenths of the total vote (or at least more than three-eighths, which is the same thing in effect), would nominate only three candidates and would read out of the party any of its members who nominated rivals to those three. For to nominate rivals to the three in that case would be to "split the party vote" and expose the party to possible disaster.
In the election, therefore, the voters would have to take their choices among the "regular" candidates of the several parties. Now suppose all the conditions to he the same except that the voter is al- lowed to indicate on his ballot as many choices as he pleases, and that those who count the ballots are to make effective the highest of his choices that can be made effective. In this case independent members of the party whose managers nominated three candidates (having in the transferable ballot the means of conducting at the election itself a competition within the party for the three places which the party may expect to win), will feel quite free to nominate rivals to the "machine" candidates of the party.
Thus the transferable vote means real competition within each party, without any reduction of the party's strength as a whole. It therefore changes the whole face of politics, requiring of political managers not the mere capturing of places on party slates, but genuine leadership.
from
Proportional Representation in the United States. Its Spread, Principles of Operation, Relation to Direct Primaries, and General Results
Author(s): C.G. Hoag
Source: The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Mar., 1923, Vol. 106, The Direct Primary (Mar., 1923), pp. 105-110
Proportional Representation in the United States. Its Spread, Principles of Operation, Relation to Direct Primaries, and General Results (jstor.org)
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