There is much discussion over some GPUS proposals, as Ken Sain posts inGreen Votes.
One proposal. which would have penalized states for not honoring the affiliation agreement to place the GPUS nominated presidential candidate on affiliated ballot lines, has generated a lot of comments on Ken’s site.
The GPUS operates under the “grassroots democracy” key value as much as possible. It’s difficult, but doable. When operating as a national organization, however, the one uniting factor is having all affiliated states agree to put the nationally elected presidential candidate on affiliated state ballot lines.
Here in Utah, there were many Greens who knew they would vote for the Independent Candidate Ralph Nader, yet wanted to have David Cobb on its ballot line to help grow the party. For those folks, it was a no brainer.
Grassroots Democracy is the foothold of the Green Party of the United States. The GPUS has no intention of taking that away from states. This key value is at the essence of everything that is discussed at the national level (I am on all discussion lists, so I see firsthand what is discussed). Nothhing is decided from the “top down”. Everyone is a stakeholder. Decisions are made from the ground up.
The fact that states are to honor the nationally elected presidential candidate was a grassroots decision in itself on affiliation. In fact, the affiliation agreement itself was a grassroots decided upon document.
Further, states decide at a grassroots level to affiliate with the GPUS. By doing so, they decide, at the grassroots level, to abide by the grassroots decided upon affiliation agreement.
The proposal recently on the voting queue to penalize states for not honoring the affiliation agreement failed because it would have required a change to the GPUS bylaws. This proposal would have made the language more clear and explicit. Had this language been in place in 2004, some Greens in some states, such as Utah, would not have interpreted the bylaws incorrectly to mean that states did not have to honor their affiliation agreement.
And so the vagueries continue to exist. Hopefully lessons learned will be a good teacher.
Deanna Dee-Dee Taylor 