Being wrong for the right reasons...

@edgarblythe,

Exactly.

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@Debra Law,

Wow.

I don't know, Debra Law. Like I said, I was really torn about this whole thing which is why I posted it.

I'll have to think on this a while.

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@engineer,

Yes, that's what bothers me; it seems like a cynical approach on his part.

If he votes for, then he could say, "I voted my conscience".

If he votes against, then he says, "I voted the way my constituents want".

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I would say that the role of an elected official is to represent the people rather than to merely act as their proxy or as some kind of electoral delegate.

I think that if it was the role of an elected official to merely vote according to what the majority of his constituents want, he might as well be replaced with some kind of system where people would vote on every decision, and you would essentially end up with a direct democracy rather than a representative democracy. Which might be desirable in some cases, but it would also essentially eliminate the advantages a representative system vs. a pure democracy: protection of minorities, safeguard against mob rule, etc.

I believe that in a situation like this one, an elected representative might better represent all of his constituents by voting against what the majority of them wants.

1 Reply

@edgarblythe,

edgarblythe wrote:

A politician cannot vote the will of his people in every case.
Extreme examples, such as enforcement of Jim Crow comes to mind.
He would not get re-elected, but he would have done the correct thing in opposing the ones that elected him.

Ed, if he is going to betray the voters who elected him,
then he shoud be honest enuf to tell them that he will do this before he entices them to vote for them.

If he fails to do so,
then he is a liar, a fraud and a liberal.

David

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@Debra Law,

Debra Law wrote:

boomerang wrote:
At least they aren't throwing married gay couples in jail in D.C.

But, if his constituents wanted to throw married gay couples in jail,
wouldn't Barry have have to vote in favor of what they wanted? Isn't that your argument?

R councilmen of D.C. authorized to enact ex post facto laws,
or bills of attainder ?

If such an ordinance were enacted,
shoud the judiciary be expected to enforce it ?

David

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@engineer,

engineer wrote:

boomerang wrote:

I think Barry is kind of a nut but I think he probably does know his constituents
and I think the vote he cast represents them.
I'd love to hear more about the aftermath of the vote --
how his constituants greeted the news of how he voted.

engineer wrote:

Quote:

I think Barry was pursuing a very savvy political path.
He knows the bill is going to pass and pass big. He knows that the
African American population in DC is vehemently against it and
will come out screaming. He can get the bill he wants,
but claim he cares more about the feelings of the people
by being the single nay vote.

I wonder if the vote was 6-6 and it came to him if he'd vote the same way?

U make a very good point.

David

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@OmSigDAVID,

OmSigDAVID wrote:

edgarblythe wrote:

A politician cannot vote the will of his people in every case.
Extreme examples, such as enforcement of Jim Crow comes to mind.
He would not get re-elected, but he would have done the correct thing in opposing the ones that elected him.

Ed, if he is going to betray the voters who elected him,
then he shoud be honest enuf to tell them that he will do this before he entices them to vote for them.

If he fails to do so,
then he is a liar, a fraud and a liberal.

David

You are so full of ****. If the constituents decided their representative ought to drop dead, should he do it?
And, after GW Bush, liars and frauds are defined as Bushites.

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@OmSigDAVID,

OmSigDAVID wrote:

Ed, if he is going to betray the voters who elected him,
then he shoud be honest enuf to tell them that he will do this before he entices them to vote for them.

If he fails to do so,
then he is a liar, a fraud and a liberal.

Barry has been upfront with his opinions on gay rights. I don't know that that doesn't make him a liar, fraud and liberal, but he has been open about his support in the past. That's what makes this an interesting question. He did betray the voters who voted for him based on his position on gay marriage, it's just that he computed they are in the extreme minority.

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I vote for a person in the expectation he/she will lead, not be a spineless jellyfish. I select the person based on my assessment of character and how the person has voted in the past. I know beforehand that not every wish of mine will be adhered to.

When the vote is split 50/50, as in Minnesota, Franken is supposed to represent everybody, not just the 200 who gave him a margin of victory. He can't vote twice, and should not abstain, necessarily. He has to make decisions, not await the latest poll.

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@OmSigDAVID,

It looks as though Barry led voters to believe he would vote for gay rights -- based on his record thus far -- and voting against recognizing gay marriages was in fact the break with his history.

Now, maybe voters weren't paying attention, or knew that about him but still thought he was a better choice than his opponent. But it doesn't seem like there was much "enticement" going on.

1 Reply

@sozobe,

I realized after that last post that I don't actually know much about this -- just what has been posted here -- and did a bit more research. This line stands out:

Clarence Page wrote:

[Barry]’s also, in case you didn’t know, a civil rights movement veteran with an admirable history of supporting gay rights and gay community issues.
He even has his name on the gay marriage bill that he voted against.

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@old europe,

Quote:

I think that if it was the role of an elected official to merely vote according to what the majority of his constituents want, he might as well be replaced with some kind of system where people would vote on every decision, and you would essentially end up with a direct democracy rather than a representative democracy.

This nation is too populous for that to work, and in the District of Columbia, you have two or three million people (at least in the greater DC area) who would have to vote on every such issue. That is why i have been specific about stipulating this attitude of mine at all but the highest levels. At all but the highest levels, i consider that the people have a right to have their (majority) views directly represented in this manner. The American constitution sought to protect the people from both majoritarian and minoritarian tyranny. A lot of those measures have been dismantled, though--such as the selection of Senators (originally left to the discretion of the states, the XVIIth Amendment in 1913 provided for the direct election of Senators, something which many states had already legislated within their own jurisdictions). The current dissatisfaction with the electoral college, another such measure (intended both to reassure the states with small populations, its specific intent was to work against majoritarian tyranny), is another example of people demanding more and more that our system of government be directly democratic.

So i remain convinced that the outrage here is as motivated by the specific issue involved as it is over any principle, and i suspect that the issue of same sex marriage motivates people's comments entirely, and that comments about democracy are just a smoke screen. As i've already pointed out, Americans enjoy direct, democratic control of many aspects of the governance of their states, counties and municipalities which the citizens of other nations don't have. I continue to believe that people are more in favor of the extension of democracy within our governments than they are the surrender of their discretion to elected representatives, unless and until it involves an issue about which they have strong feelings. I think this is basically a case of whose ox has been gored.

Mr. Barry didn't need focus groups, volunteers knocking on doors with surveys or public opinion polls to know what the people of his constituency wanted, and think it entirely appropriate, especially in a matter about which people have such strong feelings, that he voted the wishes of his constituents.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

One of the things I've been reading is that the rank-and-file constituents don't actually care much. The people who cared were a much smaller group -- about 40? -- of very influential black ministers, whose support he needs for re-election.

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Actually, Boom, states do have to recognize one another's laws in most cases, except those where Federal law allows an exception. It's called "full faith and credit," and it comes from section one of Article IV of the Constitution:

Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.

At the same time, i consider Miss Law's "what if" about jailing gay couples to be an absurdity, because the laws also protect us from abuses of our rights to due process. I don't for a moment believe that any jurisdiction could get away with an ordinance which prescribed incarceration for having acted lawfully in another jurisdiction. So, for example, in the medical marijuana example, Idaho couldn't lock you up because you had smoked dope in Oregon, although they could lock you up for bringing marijuana into their state in defiance of their laws. I see no way that the District of Columbia could make it illegal for a same sex couple to have been legally married in a different jurisdiction.

Miss Law seems to me to be suffering from the same sort of blindness caused by conviction that others in this thread have suffered. She is exercised by the issue on which Mr. Barry voted, rather than the issue of how Mr. Barry determined his vote. I could be wrong, but i doubt it.

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@sozobe,

At any rate, as Debra nicely pointed out, I think we can agree that there is a point at which even if the constituents want it, their representative shouldn't listen to them, right? If 70% of Barry's constituents want gay people thrown in jail, should he vote to have gay people thrown in jail?

If the answer is "no," there is a fatal flaw in the idea that an elected representative should just go ahead with whatever the majority of his constituents think on a given issue, no matter what that representative thinks.

1 Reply

@sozobe,

That may well be, although the point ought not to be ignored that those ministers would wreck his reelection chances by an appeal to their congregations. Certainly it is a matter of practical politics that a successful politician careful heeds the opinions of influential people within the community of his constituents. Most of my observations are based on reference to practical politics. Whatever we may think of the issue of same sex marriage, and whatever we may think of Barry's reasons for voting the way he did--he, as is the case with all politicians, has his eye steadily on those things which will keep him in office, and those things which will endanger his office holding. Whatever noble ideas people here may express, that will always be the chief motivation of a politician, whether in a democracy, an oligarchy or a tyranny. It is peeing into the wind to expect that any other motivation can be imposed on a politician.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

I pretty much agree with that. This thread started out with the idea that he did the wrong thing for the right reasons, though. I don't think he did the right thing, nor that he did it for the right -- or noble -- reasons.

1 Reply

@sozobe,

sozobe wrote:

At any rate, as Debra nicely pointed out, I think we can agree that there is a point at which even if the constituents want it, their representative shouldn't listen to them, right? If 70% of Barry's constituents want gay people thrown in jail, should he vote to have gay people thrown in jail?

If the answer is "no," there is a fatal flaw in the idea that an elected representative should just go ahead with whatever the majority of his constituents think on a given issue, no matter what that representative thinks.

I believe that we need to define the issue with greater precision.

When a candidate runs for office,
he is offering his services in furtherance of the duties of that office.
It is not within those duties, nor is it within the AUTHORIZATION
of the holder of that office to pass ex post facto laws, nor bills of attainder,
being explicitly prohibited by the US Constitution,
to whose loyalty and support a successful candidate
must pledge himself before assuming incumbency.

This is public knowledge; those are the basic ground rules,
before other issues are considered.

If a candidate claimed that he will throw married people into jail,
that 'd be like his promising to make gold out of water.
He can t do either one.

An ordinance can only be executed by the judiciary, not a legislature.
Surely defense counsel woud point out to the court
that the City Council has no authority to enact such an ordinance,
laden with ex post facto bills of attainder.
Accordingly, it is unconstitutionally void, or voidly unconstitutional.

David

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@sozobe,

Well, i don't know that Boom intended to describe him as noble. But, despite the anecdotal evidence here that i'm swimming against the tide, i think he did the right thing. More than that, he did the politically practical thing. EB used the example of Jim Crow. Virulent racism was so pervasive in America in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, in the North as well as the South, that anyone who took a principled stand against Jim Crow would either not have been elected in the first place, or would have been turned out of office so fast that his head would have spun. Before any of the righteous chorus here start choking on their indignation, i in now way suggest that this justifies Jim Crow laws. As a purely pragmatic observation, though, the electorate usually gets what they want from their politicians. Politicians ignore the public mood at the peril of their careers. Even though politicians must pay heed to their bear leaders (the large contributors or an example such as the ministers you allege to have swayed Barry), even those behind the scenes manipulators understand that politicians must bow to the public will if the issue is significant enough to the public.

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