While the primary focus of Oklahomans For Ballot Access Reform has been on Oklahoma’s draconian restrictions of the formation of new parties, that is far from the only thing wrong with Oklahoma election law. There are a number of things including our primary run-off system as well as the focus of this article, Straight Party Voting. Straight Party Voting is a system in which a voter selects a party of preference rather than voting on specific candidates. This party choice is reflected on all partisan elections on the ballot. This means that if a voter chooses the Democratic Party option on the ballot, that choice is reflected on all partisan races as if she had voted for the Democratic candidates in those races.

There are two major flaws with this voting device. The first being that Independent candidates are not represented in this system. The second being that not all races have a candidate from all qualified parties. Continue reading →