I have been a civics educator for 25 years. Over that time, I have had the pleasure of having a number of teachable moments.
Each branch, and its successes and failures, have had their “day in court” in my classroom. Quite often, the topics relate to national or international events.
However, every once in a while a local topic comes up that I can immediately interject into the conversation. After a year of people in our town feeling their voices weren’t heard, they took it to the polls.
On Tuesday, March 10, our town had its annual voting day for town and school budgets, as well as a number of warrant articles. Leading up to our town voting day were a myriad of issues that had arguably divided our town of about 16,000 more than I had ever seen since my arrival in 1990.
Issues such as expansion of our library, a communications center for our police and other town services, a $42 million school budget and a hotly contested school board race were the talk of the town for weeks. Social media provided a platform for both intellectual debates and uneducated rants and raves by so-called “keyboard warriors.”
Of particular note was the race for school board. It brought to mind James Madison’s plea in Federalist No. 10 to be wary of local politics. There, he argued governments closest to the people were the one to fear the most, because of the possibility of the formation of dangerous factions.
According to Madison, a faction was “a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adversed to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.”
For the past two years, a number of townspeople have struggled with the direction of education in our schools. According to them, a school board, consisting of five members, continually acted unilaterally without real input from concerned stakeholders in the town, such as parents, educators and concerned citizens. Groups – factions? – formed, offering both support and objections to the new direction.
Madison was spot on when he said groups like these “divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to cooperate for their common good.”
Because school board members are elected for specific terms, ultimately those terms expire and new elections are held. This gives a town the opportunity to express their satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs.
If the majority of the voting members of the town were happy with the work of the incumbents, then by popular vote they would support the incumbent candidates or new candidates that have expressed their approval of how the current educational system is working.
If the majority were unhappy, they would have the opportunity to change direction by electing people who wanted change.
Last year, there were two longtime board members up for re-election, and both lost. However, the board still maintained a 3-2 majority and could still control the direction of schools.
What I’m describing here, of course, is the concept of majoritarian rule. It’s one of a number of ideals proposed by enlightenment philosopher John Locke that can be seen in the Declaration of Independence, in addition to the social contract, consent of the governed, and ultimately the ability to “alter or abolish” government in favor of a new one that “will affect [their] safety and happiness.”
Note that altering or abolishing government doesn’t have to be via a violent revolution. It can be accomplished through something as simple as a vote.
However, my town of Milford has struggled in the past with voter turnout. We currently have about 12,000 registered voters. In past town elections, if we had anywhere from 1,500 to 2,200 people turn out to vote, that would have been a banner year. This is in spite of having the longest voting hours in the state (6 a.m. to 8 p.m.), a centralized location, same-day registration and amazing technology to help facilitate the speed of the lines.
We also have people with years of experience working the polls, and an amazing town moderator who is highly respected, incredibly knowledgeable and experienced.
By 1 p.m. in our last election, about 1,100 voters had cast votes. Many were nervous that even with hot-topic issues, we’d still fall victim to our low-voter history.
However, whether it was the 60-degree weather, inspiration from social media posts or a genuine desire to exercise civic duty, people started pouring into the polls. By 8 p.m., we had counted over 3,000 voters!
So how did it end? What initially started off as a small group of concerned citizens turned into a majority at the voting booth. Both school board seats were filled with candidates that many feel will be sympathetic to the needs of the majority of the town.
As anthropologist Margaret Mead once said, “Never underestimate the power of a small group of committed people to change the world. In fact, it is the only thing that ever has.”
It’s worth noting that these words apply not only to a global issue but on the smallest level as well.
So get out and vote! The polls are where true change is possible.
(Dave Alcox is a civics teacher at Milford High School.)