“Other” Vote for U.S. House Still to be Determined
November 11th, 2008In every presidential election year, voters of the 50 states are able to cast two votes, at least, for important policy-making office. Every voter in the 50 states may vote for president, and for U.S. House of Representatives.
Therefore, in every presidential election year, there are two measures of minor party and independent support…the presidential “other” vote, and the U.S. House “other” vote.
No one seems to have tallied the “other” vote for U.S. House yet for the 2008 election, but it seems likely to be higher than it had been in recent previous elections. The “other” vote for U.S. House had been very high in 2000, 4.17%. That had been the highest “other” vote for U.S. House since 1938. However, since 2000, the U.S. House “other” vote has been declining. It was 3.58% in 2002, 2.75% in 2004, and 2.49% in 2006. These declines undoubtably reflected the intense struggle between the two major parties for U.S. House; many voters cared intensely about the outcome of congressional elections during the George W. Bush presidency.
Although the votes for U.S. House haven’t been tallied yet, we have these clues that the 2008 “other” vote will be higher than it was in 2006: the Libertarian U.S. House total in 2006 was only 560,400, but in 2008 it is likely to be 1,050,000. The Green U.S. House total in 2006 was only 293,606, but it is likely to be close to 600,000 in 2008. The Connecticut Working Families U.S. House vote in 2006 was only 5,794, but in 2008 it is approximately 70,000.
Although one might feel that the 2008 votes for U.S. House are available now, this is not the case. No figures have been released for the New York qualified minor parties, the Independence, Working Families, and Conservative Parties, because the news organizations do not bother to do it, and the New York State Board of Elections has no results whatsoever so far.
The “other” percentage of the vote for U.S. House, for all elections 1914-2000, is in the May 1, 2001 print edition of Ballot Access News.
November 11th, 2008 at 8:53 am
Richard, I take that this percentage that you are
talking about is computed by totaling the non-major
party vote within all of the House seats where there
was one or more non-major party candidate. It would
be interesting to see what the difference would be
between those races where both major parties had a
candidate & those with only one. Increasing totals
are good to see but the number of seats should also
be listed along with how many states had 1 or more
candidate from each alternate party.
November 11th, 2008 at 10:20 am
In Idaho, they have yet to count votes for write-in canidates Gregory Nemitz for congress or Cynthia McKinley for president, not sure if this just takes longer to confirm or what! Asked the SOS office, and did not get a reply. The county office said they would be counted, but we will see.
November 11th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Louisiana cancelled its congressional elections in two districts because only one candidate filed in one district, and two Republicans filed in the other district.
Louisiana abandoned its progressive election system where all candidates could run in November, for preliminary partisan primaries. This resulted in less choice for voters. For example, in 2006 most districts had a Libertarian candidate, but in 2008 only one or two did.
November 11th, 2008 at 11:35 am
The decrease in the number of Libertarians running for the US House in 2008, compared to 2006, had nothing to do with election law changes. The Louisiana Libertarian Party had some leadership changes between 2006 and 2008. The new officers were less experienced in matters of election law and candidate recruitment.
November 11th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
I an gratified to see the vote totals for all dissent party candidates for the U.S. House trend up significantly. Although I am a Libertarian, I root for other party candidates also. The more all of us the less for BOTH of THEM!