Mayoral Candidate: Third Party Ballot Spot is Will of the People

Editor's Note: A number of Middletown's Realistic Balance third-party nominated candidates found themselves taken off the November ballot late last month after a discrepancy in endorsement signatures. John Kilian is running for mayor against Democrat Dan Drew on the ticket.

To the Editor:

Many may see the plight of the Realistic Balance Party of Middletown as a trivial affair in this city's rich political culture. While I am the last one to object to good-natured ribbing, having pilloried with sarcasm many in our city in my literature, this is no joking matter.

The political privileges bestowed on a political party emanate from its performance in the prior election. The power to place nominees on the ballot, with the consent of such nominees who care to receive such an endorsement, originates from the will of the people, not the whim of town hall or the state. Our nominations are not Caesar's coin to take.

The ballot belongs to the people, with the government as its trustee, not its owner. Elections are an indispensable public entity. Elections are the property of the people, and only through them can the governed grant their consent, which is the basis of all authority of any government that claims to constitute a democracy.

The relative ease with which the city chose to dispense with the Realistic Balance Party's Planning and Zoning slate comes in a year when public discontent with the P&Z has been manifest by large numbers of speakers at public hearings stating their opposition to zoning changes, and their complaints being reciprocated by a unanimous vote by the sitting P&Z to approve these unpopular changes.

Further discontent was expressed through a Democratic Party primary that saw an opponent of these unpopular changes receive more votes than the slate proposed by the party leadership.

This candidate was also nominated earlier by the Realistic Balance Party, and his appearance on this line would likely provide a comfortable margin of victory in the November election. His name was put on the ballot by the same means as others were in the prior election.

No laws changed since the 2011 election relevant to this process that might alert us that anything different needed to be done this year. No notice was given by the city that this process would change. It was not until after the deadline for compliance had passed, and primary results had proven the challenger of the status quo would be a contender, that our city decided to enforce a new regime of ballot access.

With weeks to go before ballots were to be published, they maintained that it was just too late to allow nominees to grant their consent to be on the ballot. The candidates have registered their consent, but the city ignores them, as though some imaginary train has already left the station, and duly nominated candidates are nothing more than helpless pedestrians on an empty platform, waiting for the next train to come in two years time.  

But the truth is that the train never left the station. What is keeping them off the train is a city that has locked the doors. We can see the conductors through the windows, callously disregarding our request to enter. Whose train is this, anyway?

When you talk to the city, they say, “We can't fix this.”

Well, when it comes to securing the integrity of ballot, I say, “You can't break this.”

Playing fast and loose with our elections jeopardizes the legitimacy of our entire government.

John Kilian, Secretary, Realistic Balance Party of Middletown