After liberals won four of the last five Wisconsin Supreme Court races, Derrick Van Orden had a simple solution.
“I think they should get rid of that (nonpartisan spring election) and fold it into a midterm or a four-year cycle,” the Republican congressman told reporters. That would be like the Chicago Bears asking to stop playing the Green Bay Packers because the Packers won 11 of the last 12 games.
Wisconsin’s spring elections date back even further than that rivalry — all the way back to 1854. And unlike changing the NFL schedule, electing judges during fall partisan elections would require amending the state constitution.
Since statehood, the constitution has prohibited judicial elections within 30 days of elections for other state officials, except the superintendent of public instruction, in an attempt to reduce partisanship. Some early judicial elections were held in August and September before they were combined with the spring date for choosing local leaders.
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Van Orden’s idea raises numerous other questions, say political scientists and elected officials. Specifically:
Would all of our currently nonpartisan judicial and local races become partisan?
“I think most Wisconsinites would blanch at that,” says Mordecai Lee, a professor emeritus at UW-Milwaukee. Most local officials are committed to solving community problems in a nonpartisan way, adds state Rep. Lee Snodgrass (D-Appleton), ranking Democrat on the Assembly Campaigns and Elections Committee. It might make more sense to change district attorneys, sheriffs and other county officials now elected in the fall from partisan to nonpartisan offices, Mordecai Lee adds.
Would the fall ballot mix partisan and nonpartisan races?
While it would be technically possible to design a ballot like that, it would be long and “I think it would be very confusing to the voter,” says Wood County Clerk Trent Miner, president of the Wisconsin County Clerks Association.
Would local races get any attention if they shared a crowded fall ballot with presidential, gubernatorial and U.S. Senate elections?
“Long ballots didn’t matter as much when large numbers of people were just voting a straight-party ticket,” says Charles Franklin, director of the Marquette University Law School Poll. “We don’t live in that era anymore,” and this change could reduce voter information about down-ballot races.
Wouldn’t we still need spring elections to hold meaningful presidential primaries?
As the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel noted, ending all spring elections would push Wisconsin’s presidential primary back to the August partisan primary, rendering it useless if party conventions have already chosen nominees. That’s not going to happen, Franklin says, but it would be “a substantial change” for Wisconsin to hold a standalone presidential primary, as some other states do, instead of consolidating it with other elections to save money. Miner says “it would be a huge headache” to hold an election just for one race.
Would this disrupt election schedules?
“We’re kind of messing with the way municipal races are set up,” Snodgrass says. Moving every contest from annual spring elections to biennial fall elections would require adjusting the terms of thousands of sitting local officials and judges. Every school board member outside the Milwaukee Public Schools serves a three-year term, as do some municipal officials. And some local governments and school districts stagger elections so that different members of common councils and school, village and town boards are chosen in different years, Snodgrass notes.
IT’S NOT CLEAR whether Van Orden has thought about any of those questions. His campaign office didn’t respond to emails seeking comment.
That doesn’t mean those questions will go away. A spokesman for Rep. Dave Maxey (R-New Berlin), Assembly Campaigns and Elections chair, told the Journal Sentinel that Van Orden’s idea is “worth serious discussion.”
Snodgrass disagreed, calling Van Orden’s comments “just another insane thing out of his mouth, based on something partisan.” Van Orden said he came up with the idea because “Republicans … just don’t vote in spring elections.”
But that’s a relatively recent development, Franklin and Lee say. Until a few years ago, Republicans were more likely to turn out for low-profile elections, they note. And for years, conservatives held the edge in high court races.
Van Orden isn’t alone in seeking this kind of change for short-term advantage. In 2009, after conservative Michael Gableman defeated liberal incumbent Louis Butler in a contentious Supreme Court contest, flipping ideological control of the high court, Sen. Tim Carpenter (D-Milwaukee) introduced a constitutional amendment to end spring elections, Wisconsin Public Radio reported. Carpenter declined to comment on his proposal, which died in committee in what was then a Democratic-led Legislature.
“I think this is why so many Wisconsinites are disgusted with politics in general,” says Lee, decrying a “situational ethics morality” of legislating based on what’s best for one’s party instead of what’s best for the state.
But just as liberals eventually bounced back to regain control of the Supreme Court, the pendulum could swing back the other way by the time the state amends its constitution to end spring elections, Lee says.
After all, even the Bears finally snapped that Packers winning streak.
