November 4th 2014 Ballot
The 2014 midterm election is just two weeks away. Depending upon where you live, the ballot varies. Everyone has US Representatives and State Representatives. Missouri voters, of course, have constitutional amendments. Most have the retention of judges.
For this post I looked at the sample ballot for all raves in St. Louis:
- State Auditor — three candidates, the incumbent will likely win.
- U.S. District Rep 1 — three candidates. I like that the Republican challenger to Lacy Clay supports ending the War on Drugs and favors marriage equality, he also advocates eliminating the federal income tax, replacing it with a national sales tax — reason enough to not support his candidacy.
- State Senate Dist 4 — two candidates, the incumbent will likely win.
- State Rep, twelve districts: 66, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 91, 93
- Three are uncontested: 76, 77, 84
- No way would I vote to add to the Republican majority in Jefferson City!
- St. Louis Collector of Revenue — one candidate
- St. Louis License Collector — two candidates
- St. Louis Recorder of Deeds — three candidates
- The most interesting local race!
- The Democrat, Sharon Quigley Carpenter, resigned amid nepotism charges in July, but won the Democratic primary in August
- Young Republican Erik Shelquist is seeking to become the first Republican elected to citywide office in decades.
- And Independent Jennifer Florida, the former 15th ward Alderman, appointed when Carpenter resigned.
- The real race is between Carpenter & Florida. Will voters go with the Democratic nominee even though she’d been in office for decades and resigned in disgrace?
- Retain two Missouri Supreme Court judges
- Retain two Missouri Court of Appeals judges (Eastern District)
- Retain seven Circuit Court judges (22nd)
- Missouri Constitutional Amendment 3 — teacher evaluation
- From the ballot language “Significant potential costs may be incurred by the state and/or the districts if new/additional evaluation instruments must be developed to satisfy the proposal’s performance evaluation requirements.”
- This isn’t about improving the quality of education, it’s a union busting measure. The Kirkwood School Board voted to oppose this amendment, please vote no.
- Missouri Constitutional Amendment 6 — early voting… sorta
- I fully support early voting, but not this way.The ACLU of Missouri called it a “sham early voting amendment”, please vote no.
- Missouri Constitutional Amendment 10 — budget power
- The GOP Missouri Legislature doesn’t like the checks & balances from the Governor’s office, when it’s a Democrat in office.
- “We believe this amendment could reduce the flexibility to make changes to balance the budget and make the process more difficult. We believe this amendment could potentially weaken the state’s strong governmental framework to make midyear budget adjustments, which in our view, could potentially lower the rating to a level in line with our indicative rating under our state scoring methodology.” — Standard & Poor’s
- “Vote no on Amendment 10. It’s not conservative. It is short-sighted. It’s bad for business. It’s bad for Missouri.” — Post-Dispatch editorial
- St. Louis Charter Amendment — Veterans’ Preference, would give honorable discharged veterans hiring preference for civil service jobs
See the Post-Dispatch Voter’s Guide for races where you live.
— Steve Patterson
I don’t get the constant use of constitutional amendments. We have a seriously broken political system.
It’s a) an end run around the legislature, and b) it makes it harder to change it in the future – it either needs to be struck down in court or changed by another constitutional amendment.
Two of the three measures originated in the legislature.
My response to gmichaud was a general response, not just to the three on this ballot – there seems to have been a proliferation of constitutional amendment proposals recently, many for issues that should be decided in the legislature, and not by popular, albeit low-information, elections. The voting one, this time, originated in the legislature in response to a grass-roots effort that would have offered a lot more options; unfortunately, that effort didn’t make it to the ballot. And you’re right, the budget one is a power grab by the legislature. All three need to be voted down.