Question 1): A group called ‘Reproductive Freedom For All’ just turned in 753,759 petition signatures to the Secretary Of State to put legalized abortion on the November 8 ballot. That means tens of thousands of voters who are angry about Roe v Wade being overturned will turn out and probably vote for Democratic candidates as well as this pro-choice proposal. In other words, we can forget about a Red Wave election in Michigan this year — right?
Answer 1): By no means. There is the old adage: “Be careful what you wish for …” In 1972, abortion rights advocates thought they had a winner in an initiated ballot proposal that read: “Allow licensed physicians to perform abortions upon demand if period of gestation has not exceeded 20 weeks.” It got clobbered by the electorate by a roughly 3-2 margin. It didn’t help George McGovern, either, or Democrats up and down the ticket — they took a bath. Then, in 1988, the following wording appeared on a statewide ballot: “Prohibit use of public funds for the abortion of a recipient of welfare benefits unless the abortion is necessary to save the life of the mother.” It was approved by a margin nearly as strong as the 1972 proposal was rejected. Fact is, there is a lot of nuance in this most explosive of social issues. Yes, polls have shown that a majority of voters, nationally and in Michigan, did not want to see Roe v. Wade overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court, but other surveys have also shown that a substantial majority of the citizenry support some restraints on abortion, for example what has been dubbed “partial birth abortion.” This year, it will depend on how the language of this initiated ballot proposal is perceived by the electorate, and how it is marketed by the two opposing sides, one pro-choice and the other pro-life. In the governor’s race, whichever major party nominee positions herself as the most “reasonable” and level-headed in her attitude toward abortion and what ought to be the law will have at least a slight advantage. Over-the-top, frothing-at the-mouth outrage won’t work. Same goes for all other candidates, Democrat and Republican, up and down the ballot. This issue and how it affects hundreds of races will ultimately be decided by the broad middle of the electorate, not the fanatics on each extreme who think that if their adherents can only be motivated to “show up” at the polls, everything will go their way.
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Question 2): We know courts insist they don’t let politics impact their actions. Does that mean the Michigan Supreme Court won’t wait until after the November election to decide whether the state’s 1931 statute outlawing abortion is valid?
ANSWER 2): What’s the hurry? If we take the courts or, in this case, the Michigan Supreme Court at its word, that doesn’t necessarily mean the panel MUST make a quick decision on whether the state’s 1931 law should go into effect, or be thrown out in the wake of the Roe decision. The justices could take their own sweet time before issuing any verdict, and they have good reason to do so — like, what about the abortion rights proposal that looks likely to be on the Nov. 8 statewide ballot? As Mr. Dooley said, “The Supreme Court follows the election returns,” and two of the justices, Republican Brian Zahra and Democrat Richard Bernstein, are running for re-election this year and can’t be thrilled at having to deal with the abortion curve ball that has floated up to their plate. In sum, there are going to be a dozen twists and turns to this saga in the next few years, no matter what the high bench may or may not decide between now and November.
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Question 3): Has this year’s field of relatively unknown GOP gubernatorial hopefuls enhanced the value of political endorsements despite the perceived anti-establishment mood of Republican voters?
ANSWER 3): Some endorsements mean more than others, and some mean different things to different people. Still, it’s better to get them than to be shut out. In the race for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, we’ve already gotten an answer as to what endorsements mean — Tudor Dixon last month received the “trifecta” of gold-plated GOP endorsements, from Right to Life, the Michigan Chamber of Commerce, and the DeVos family. Now, a Mitchell Communications poll shows her vaulting from single digits nowheresville — where she’s been mired for a year — into an 11% lead over the nearest of her four male rivals. Whether she can sustain this, and build on it is another question, but, yes, the right endorsements at the right time — and if she can do a good job publicizing them — can make a big difference.
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Question 4): Is Michigan’s reputation as a ‘ticket-splitting’ state still justified?
ANSWER 4): Why wouldn’t it be? The original nationally-acclaimed book entitled “The Ticket-Splitter,” co-authored by the late Walt DeVries, a top aide to then-Gov. George Romney back in the 1960s, was about this phenomenon in Michigan. It told the story about how Romney was able to survive Republican Barry Goldwater getting buried by LBJ by more than a million votes at the top of the ticket in 1964. Republican Romney, however, got re-elected the same year by some half a million ballots. Now, that’s ticket-splitting — a 1.5 million vote swing! Maybe we haven’t seen anything quite that dramatic in recent years, and the demography and ideological profiles of today’s ticket-splitters may be different than half a century ago, but they still matter. Consider Gov. Rick Snyder being re-elected by about 4% in 2014 while his U.S. Senate GOP running mate, Terri Lynn Land, was being buried by Democrat Gary Peters by double digits. Ticket-splitting will always be with us, and it still can spell the difference between victory and defeat in a close race. Everybody keeps talking about how ‘polarized’ we all are, as if all votes are coming in solid red and blue blocs, with nothing in between. It ain’t so.
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Nice article, Bill.
On point 1, it will depend on the language. If the language says abortion is ok through the entire nine months of pregnancy, it will be hard to win. The problem with polling on abortion is that most people have no idea what Roe and its successor case Casey, actually mean. Most people, I suspect, would agree with John Roberts, uphold the cases but ban elective abortion after say 15 weeks. The problem with that is neither Roe nor Casey actually say that. The campaign should be interesting.
On the abortion point and the MI Supremes (Point 2), the issue I think they will have to resolve is Gleicher’s temporary injunction and whether she should have recused herself. Planned Parenthood of MI is the plaintiff who asked for the injunction, and she’s given $$$ to PP and has accepted awards from PP (and included them in her bio in the past). But the biggest problem is her functioning as a judge on the Court of Claims. What she has done is placed an injunction on a MI Court of Appeals case (Mahaffey v. Michigan AG) THAT SHE LOST as an attorney. Admittedly, my non-lawyer brain does not understand all the accepted nuances of the law – including the Court of Claims statute – but it does not seem proper that a judge acting as a circuit judge issues an injunction that effectively nullifies a decision – unanimous I might add – from the Court of Appeals that she lost. If this is proper for her to do (effectively nullify the C of A decision), no Court of Appeals decision is safe from any judge on the Court of Claims, not to mention the rules on recusal being gutted. As they used say back in the day, film at 11.
That Michigan is reputed for being a “ticket-splitting” state is a good thing, I believe; it suggests that Michiganders are equal parts open-minded, discerning, and savvy enough to make distinctions between the three branches of government as well as the three layers of authority under federalism (national, state, and local government).