INCUMBENTS AND ELECTIONS

I wrote the following for another forum, in another country, so it is necessarily simplistic. That should be, however, all the more reason for a discussion of this topic. Please comment on this situation as you see fit.

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There are great advantages which incumbents in the United States Congress enjoy. To review them in the simplest terms, they are: the Congressional "junket," in which members travel--at tax-payers expense--on various pretexts, usually described as "fact-finding missions," suggesting that they are diligently informing themselves on issues important to the voters. This provides an opportunity for members to get their names and faces before the public in local news outlets--newspapters, magazines, radio, television--without the actual expense of paying for the exposure. Another significant privilege which members enjoy and which is not available to their potential opponents is the franking privilege--members of Congress can send materials through the mail free of charge; measures to prevent this privilege being used for electoral purposes have been aenemic and ineffective. Finally, members of Congress have known track records for policy statements and a known voting record--this allows them to specifically target potential donors to their campaigns. This is a huge advantage--in the fifty plus years since the Eisenhower campaign produced a little jingle for use on television during his Presidential campaign, radio and especially television advertising have become crucial to successful campaigning. This is become very expensive and makes money-raising success a key trait of the successful politician. The value of this to the incumbent is out of all proportion to the value of any other advantage which they enjoy.

These advantages, of course, accrue to members of both of the two major political parties in the United States. The parties have a death grip on the electoral process, and assure that they derive the maximum advantage. It is only within the last twenty years that voter registration in the states has eliminated the requirement to register as an independent or the member of one or the other of the two major parties. Restricting voting in primary elections was a product of the party registration requirement, and this produces a huge psychological advantage for the members of the two parties, as news reports will suggest that they possess a "momentum" which won't be discussed with regard to independents or members of nascent third parties. Election workers and observers are drawn from the ranks of activist members of the two parties in any given community. One needn't suggest that they are venal or dishonest to understand that they'll have little incentive to rigorously safeguard the rights of independents or members of third parties. In any disputed contest, the rich coffers of the two major parties provide access to legal talent which the independent or member of a third party will likely not be able to match.

The Republicans and Democrats enjoy these great advantages, and guard them zealously. The complexion of the Congress has become more and more difficult to change because of the advantages of the incumbent, particularly that which derives from television advertising. The Republicans only gained control of the House with great difficulty and expense, over a twenty year period. They have been unable to secure and maintain a certain majority in the Senate. The issue of the advantages which might accrue to the Democrats in the Congress in future should not be canvassed without a due regard for the advantages the incumbents enjoy, and the difficulty which is therefore attendant upon any attempt by the Democrats to change the complexion of the Congress. The task is for obvious reasons all the more daunting for an independent or any would-be third party.