When deciding on the candidate for whom you cast your vote in an
election, a number of moral principles have to be considered. As I have often
written in the past, the position of the candidate him/herself on the most
important issues is of key importance, because by putting that person in a
position to vote on legislation, you help to move public policy either closer or
farther away from the moral law.
But that very consideration also means that the positions of the
party to which the candidate belongs also matter. By putting that candidate
in office, you also help to put his/her party into power. This has to be
taken into consideration, too. Voters need to ask how much the election of a
particular candidate will shift the balance of power between the parties, and
what will happen when a particular party takes control. Voters should know the
platform of the party and the official positions of party leadership on the
same moral issues on which the individual candidate is evaluated.
At times, in all parties, the individual candidate will take a
different position than his/her party on fundamental moral issues. Yet if the
election of that candidate would shift control to his/her party, which holds the
opposite position on those issues, a vote for that candidate, in effect,
works against the position the voter may be trying to advance.
In short, the party matters.
To illustrate why the party matters, let's look at what happens in the
United States Senate.
The Majority party in the Senate chooses the Majority Leader. The
Majority Leader has control of the Senate schedule and agenda. This includes the
ability to select the timing for floor proceedings, that is, debates,
consideration of amendments, and voting, both for legislation and nominations.
The Majority Party has a majority on all committees (except the
Ethics Committee), usually in close proportion to its share of the body as a
whole. The Majority Party on every committee also controls a majority of the
staff on the committee.
The Majority in each committee recommends to their caucus a Committee
Chairman. Typically, their selection is rubberstamped by the Majority Party in
the Senate. The chairmen, in turn, set the agenda of their respective
committees. This is an extremely powerful post. For example, chairmen sometimes
refuse to schedule hearings on nominees and legislation, and this effectively
kills them. In other words, the best candidate in either party could introduce
the best legislation imaginable, and it would never come out of committee. The
party matters.
Considerations about what party would be in power as a result of the
outcome of a particular election become especially relevant when the opposing
candidates take the same position on issues of key importance.
Reflections like these are not an endorsement of a party; rather, they
are an aspect of the duty that we as clergy have to articulate the moral
dimensions of voting. If they benefit one party over another, that's not by our
choice, but by the choice of the party to take the positions it takes.
