|
Robert
Winn elected not to fill out the questionnaire, but rather to submit
the following statement in its place. Fine by us. Toward the end,
he gives us a capsule history of the Two Pary System - it's well
worth a read.
Thank
you for the information on your darkhorse web site. As the darkest
horse in American politics, I would like to get more on your website
than the information I sent to project vote smart.
My
reason for running for public office relates to independent voters
and independent candidates as they exist at the present time in
the United States and the state of Arizona. In 1984 an article appeared
in the Arizona Republic newspaper about independent voters which
described them as being the least informed and least interested
portion of the electorate. Perceiving this to be the beginning of
an attempt to do away with independent voters in the State of Arizona,
a closed primary state, I registered as an independent candidate
for the United States Senate against John McCain and requested appointment
of a deputy registrar for my campaign in accordance with Arizona
election laws, which was denied by the County recorder on the basis
of a letter he had received from the Secretary of State saying that
I was not really a candidate even though I had registered as such
with the Secretary of State. Perceiving that the attempt to do away
with independent voters was further along than I had at first thought
I contacted another independent candidate who was running for Governer
of the state and suggested that I become a deputy registrar in her
campaign, which we were able to accomplish.
Accordingly,
we spent some time registering voters at a local junior college.
After the election I wrote to the County Recorder requesting appointment
as a permanent Deputy Registrar for Maricopa County and was appointed,
serving in that position for two more years. During the impeachment
of Governor Mecham, I went to the office of the County Recorder
to turn in a voter registration, and was startled to hear two clerks
discussing the fact that the County Recorder had received instructions
that independent voters were no longer eligible to serve as deputy
registrars. On December 31, 1988, I received official notice that
I was being dismissed as a Deputy Registrar and was no longer eligible
for appointment to that position since a law had been passed requiring
party membership and recommendation by a political party committee
for appointment to deputy registrar.
I
went to the newspaper in my city, spent a couple of hours with a
newspaper reporter explaining the situation, after which the reporter
contacted me by telephone to tell me that his editor would not let
him write the story.
I
then registered as a candidate for governor of Arizona, contacted
the President of the Arizona Senate and received permission to hold
a press conference on the grounds of the Arizona State Capitol.
Then I contacted all major segments of the news media informing
them of the time and place, went at the appointed hour, and was
, of course, ignored by the news media. I then contacted them again
to ask, Why did you boycott my press conference?
"Oh,
we would never do that", they all said. "Well, goo",
I told them, "I will schedule another one". The second
time , there was a news photographer from the Arizona Republic on
the grounds of the Capitol taking pictures of a tax demonstration.
I approached this individual and asked him if he would like to take
a picture of my press conference. This seemed to excite his imagination.
"Get
out there in the middle of the plaza", he told me, "We
need to get a sense of total isolation."
So
he took my picture, which appeared in the Republic newspaper with
the caption, Robert B. Winn stands all alone at the Arizona capitol,
explaining that news reporters were actually frantically trying
to find me, but had been unable to locate my press conference, but
also giving me a bit of information I was able to put to good use.
There was a Capitol Press Corps room in the Senate building about
50 feet away from where I had been.
So
I scheduled another press conference with the media, and ten minutes
before the scheduled time, I went to their Press Corps room and
announced in person that I would be outside if they wanted to listen
to me and went out and waited. The press corps sent two newspaper
reporters out.. I gave a little speech announcing my candidacy for
Governor and informed them of the dismissal of independent deputy
registrars, thanked them for their attendance at my press conference
and went home.
A little
one paragraph article appeared in the Arizona Republic concerning
my candidacy for Governor, also noting the dismissal of independent
deputy registrars as my reason for running. The same day, I was
contacted by an Independent voter in from Glendale, Arizona, who
wanted details of the dismissal. That lady filed a court case against
the state of Arizona resulting in the present method of voter registration
in Arizona, open registration. Any person can go the the office
of the County Recorder and get voter registration forms and register
voters.
We
see from this the extremes that political parties give us in government.
It will either be one extreme or the other, nothing else.
With
this in mind, I would like to comment on the origins of the two-party
system of government and its application to the government of the
United States. Two-party government began with a declaration of
war issued by the king of England against Parliament. In the ensuing
bloody civil war, King Charles I and his armies were unsuccessful
against the armies of Parliament under Oliver Cromwell. With the
surrender of the King, Charles I was tried for treason and beheaded.
Parliament convened to abolish the office of king forever, declaring
England to be a free nation. Oliver Cromwell served as head of state
until his death.
Parliament
had made no provision for replacement of Cromwell. As the government
sank deeper and deeper into political confusion, a faction favoring
reinstatement of the office of king gained a majority in Parliament.
A delegation was sent to France to talk to Charles, the son of Charles
I, requesting that he return to England and assume the throne. Charles
graciously consented.
Charles
II was one of the worst kings in English history. However, he did
perform two official acts as king that affect government to this
day. The first was execution and drawing and quartering of the eleven
judges who had sentenced his father to death. The second was initiation
of the two-party system of political corruption.
Charles
was a weak king. He could do almost nothing without consent of Parliament.
In searching for ways to weaken the control Parliament had over
him, his attention was drawn to two disruptive factions in Parliament
which called each other by the derisive names of Whigs and Tories.
Whigs was short for Whigamores, a Scottish separatist rebel faction.
Tories were a group of notorious Irish highwaymen.
Charles
announced to Parliament that whichever of these two factions held
a majority in Parliament would have an exclusive right to serve
as ministers in his cabinet. This practice was so beneficial to
the king that succeeding kings continued the practice, which was
officially written into English law during the reign of Queen Anne.
The
Whig Party dominated English politics until it became so corrupt
that it lost its majority, at which time the Tories came into power
with promises of reform and honest government. In a pattern which
has repeated itself many times in two-party government, the Whig
Party faded into oblivion, its members moving to positions in the
Tory Party, and another opposition party was formed to oppose the
corruption of the Tory party. By 1776, the Tory and Labor Parties
had raised taxes so high that the American colonies revolted.
Political
parties were not popular with Americans at the time of the Revolution.
Americans were well aware that the primary cause of the war had
been the practice of English political parties in appropriating
public funds to personal and party uses, at the same time denying
the colonists any voice in government to oppose the resulting high
taxes. When the Constitution was written, no mention was made of
political parties in the hope that they would never become popular
with the people of the United States.
The
first two Presidents of the United States were both vocal in their
opposition to the formation of political parties.
The
election of 1800 was the downfall of the idea of incorrupt and partyless
government. It happened because of an error in the Constitution.
The Constitution provided for election of the President and vice-President
through the electoral college. Each elector in the electoral college
would cast two votes voting for two candidates. The candidate who
received the highest number of electoral votes would become President,
the candidate receiving the second highest number of votes would
become vice-President. The problem was that there was no provision
for resolving a tie vote in the electoral college.
This
system worked fine for the first two elections under the Constitution.
However, two opposing factions were forming which would destroy
free and open elections in the United States. One faction called
themselves the Federalists and were more a collection of people
seeking to enrich themselves at public expense than an organized
party. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison were the chief organizers
of opposition to the Federalists. Finding their ideas of organization
through the press and in Congress to be largely ineffective, they
hit upon the idea of caucuses, the use of elected public officials
as organizers of party at the local level. This extra-legal use
of public officials was so effective that it completely overcame
the Federalists within a short time. It also completely overcame
free and open elections.
The
Republican-Democrat followers of Jefferson and Madison decided to
attempt to control both top offices, so accordingly, they ran Jefferson
for President and Aaron Burr for vice-President, although both men
were candidates for President in accordance with the Constitution.
When the electors met to cast their votes, all Republican-Democrat
electors voted for Jefferson and Burr. The result was a tie vote
in the electoral college, throwing the election into the House of
Representatives to be decided. Aaron Burr decided he would rather
be President than vice-President, so he began to make deals to gain
support of Congressmen. The House of Representatives voted more
than thirty times before finally selecting Jefferson. This was considered
such a traumatic experience at the time for members of Congress
that they passed an Amendment giving control of the office of vice-President
to political party appointment so that they could avoid having to
make such an important decision ever again.
Just
as had happened in England, freedom was sold out at the first opportunity
in this country, putting the nation back under the same system of
corruption it had fought so hard to remove. We now live under a
system of matching funds, party financing, contributions, corrupt
news media, and political exclusion which makes the English at the
time of the Revolutionary War look like honest people.
To
place responsibility where responsiblility lies, this is what the
American people say they want. This is what they truly deserve to
have.
Robert
B. Winn
May 14th, 2000
|
