Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, July 15, 1994 TAG: 9407160007
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Yet, however unlikely, Virginians have no cause to be pleased with the possibility. Can you imagine the commonwealth represented by a senator who was opposed by three-fourths of the electorate? Not good.
It is too late to prevent the possibility this year. (Unless, of course, one or more of the candidates folds before Election Day. But it would be impudent and premature to recommend dropping out for anyone at this point.)
Granted, too, this is a most unusual election - not just because of the crowded field, but also because of the circumstances that crowded it and the characters in the crowd. The likes of this one Virginia may never see again.
But that is not a sure bet.
If bitter factionalism continues to grow within the two major parties, the GOP in particular, and if a rump third party should get a foothold, and if independent candidacies become increasingly common and viable, Virginia might face more multiple-choice election tests.
Which leads one to wonder: As a precaution against future electoral skewing, should lawmakers toy with the idea of amending state law to provide for runoff elections?
Current law requires only a plurality for victory. Thus, in a multi-candidate race, an active minority - be it Christian fundamentalists supporting North or labor and gay-rights groups supporting Robb - enjoys an amplified voice.
No one's saying they shouldn't have a voice. We simply like the old-fashioned democratic notion of majority rule, and its practical implication that candidates must woo the middle to win.
Incidentally, runoff elections wouldn't be a radical or unprecedented concept for Virginia. From 1952 to 1970, state law mandated runoffs in multi-candidate primary elections in which no candidate for statewide office won 50 percent of the vote. The winnowing-out runoff was used twice - to choose the Democrats' candidates for governor and attorney general in 1969.
By and large, nobody missed the runoff provision when it was scrapped by the legislature in 1970. But the '70s were marked by a great strengthening of the Republican Party of Virginia, and the two-party system generally. Little thought was given to circumstances that might produce independent candidacies from within the fractured ranks of either party - much less from within both, as from whence the Wilder and Coleman candidacies emerged this year.
To be sure, runoffs have an unseemly tradition in the South, as a device for excluding black-voter influence. But that worry is less relevant today. Only two other states - Georgia and Vermont - now have runoffs for general elections. Other states have not seen the need. Up to now, that could also be said for Virginia. But, after November, will that still be true?
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