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Should we abolish the state legislature by referendum?
By Ron Newman on Thu, 10/23/2008 - 4:52pm
And then replace it by "100 randomly selected adult residents of the Commonwealth"?
That question will be on next month's ballot in half of Somerville.
The proponent's Commonwealth Jury blog has some explanation of the proposal.
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Comments
Abolish!
Would they be able to take leave from their jobs? If so, then I support this.
If anything, it addresses campaign finance issues. Most of our elected officials are rich snobs with fancy degrees who do tricks for their peers and the cabals which support them.
Just sayin'
I'd rather implement a secure way to have the populace itself vote on things, so there would be no need for this "republic" sham version of democracy.
Define Randomly Selected
There are lots of ways to "pseudorandomly" select sets from a data set, but no such thing as a truly random algorhythm. Make enough selections, and there will be a bit of random bias based on the method of choice. Discuss.
Also, would I still get paid by my employer for my service (ala jury duty rules)?
Link to details
I edited my post to add in a link to the proponent's web site.
Sure there is
Not to belabor this point because it's such a small matter, but your complaint is focusing on a really tiny, technical issue when the greater question is much more interesting.
There are plenty of ways to generate sufficient randomness to handle this case. But you probably wouldn't want a truly "random" outcome anyway. At the least I'd think there would be a mandate for geographic diversity - a truly "random" outcome could pick 100 people from the same neigborhood. It's unlikely, but it's possible and in true "random" selection it's as likely as any other outcome.
Randomness is put to use every day in applications from computer security (cryptography relies on highly random sources) to Vegas, where one of the more expensive and state-regulated components of every casino is the source of randomness for electronic games of chance.
We already randomly select jurors for trials
so presumably whatever algorithm we use for that could also be used for this hypothetical sortition scheme.
It would make better sense than eliminating the income tax...
If the residents of the Commonwealth are pissed off at the Legislature, eliminating all of their positions is not only an effective method to clear out all the deadwood, but a pretty nice cost saving measure too.
I would slightly demur on "randomly selected adult residents," because will sound like jury duty to some people. If they don't want to do it, fine, off to the next person.
At first I liked the idea of the income tax elimination, but then I figured the Legislature would ignore this like all other efforts to reduce the income tax. This is a lot like the "selling wine and beer in supermarkets" referendum in 2006, where the package stores wielded hefty influence on the voters to vote it down.