When political junkies woke up all bleary-eyed and fuzzy-headed on Nov. 3, 2004, the thing they couldn’t fathom – even after strong coffee – was what the heck happened in Colorado.
While the rest of the country was electing Republicans willy-nilly, Colorado replaced Republicans with Democrats in the U.S. Senate and the 3rd Congressional District and elected Democratic majorities in the state Senate and House for the first time in 40 years.
It was stunning.
Most bewildered morning-after pundits focused on the money. Contributions from millionaire political activists had financed soft-money campaigns that most people assumed had turned the corner for Democrats in key districts.
But that was just the half of it.
Daniel Smith, a political scientist at the University of Florida who taught at the University of Denver from 1994 to 2003, has analyzed the 2004 election in Colorado, and his findings suggest that two ballot initiatives – FasTracks and Amendment 37, the renewable-energy measure – changed the perspectives of voters in ways most political analysts are only beginning to understand.
The measures didn’t drive turnout so much as they altered perceptions, he said. Voters looked at politicians “through a different lens.”
It was no accident.
Thad Kousser and Mathew McCubbins, political scientists from the University of California-San Diego who also studied the Colorado election, found that Democratic Party political operatives began planning the strategy in 2002.
“They found a disgruntled cohort of young baby boomers and older Generation X’ers living in the newly developed suburbs around Denver,” the professors said in a paper published in January 2005.
Through surveys and focus groups, the Dems identified two crucial frustrations: These voters despised their miserable commutes and they were angry about increasingly high electricity prices.
Bingo.
But getting FasTracks and Amendment 37 on the ballot was only Step 1.
Just as critical, Kousser and McCubbins said, “was getting Republicans, such as Gov. Bill Owens, to oppose the measures, which would provide a cue to the targeted voters that their interests were more similar to Democrats’ than Republicans’.”
Owens obliged and, voila, a wildly successful wedge-issues campaign was born.
It’s with this in mind that partisans of both stripes view this week as monumental in the 2006 election campaign.
Monday is the deadline for submitting petitions to qualify a raft of initiative measures for the Nov. 7 election ballot.
This year, both parties want to exploit their favorite wedge issues to buoy candidates in tight races. So surrogates have floated measures to impose term limits on judges, legalize marijuana possession, increase the minimum wage and reprise the gay-marriage debate yet again.
The strategy could be even more influential than it was in 2004.
Between 1980 and 2004, the data show that for every initiative on a ballot, turnout in midterm elections increased slightly. During presidential elections, ballot initiatives prompted a smaller increase in turnout.
And in a tight governor’s or 7th Congressional District race, even a small increase in turnout could change everything.
And since initiative campaigns aren’t subject to campaign-finance limitations, voters can be bombarded with the not-so-subtle messaging ad nauseam.
In 2006, the key initiative likely will be the measure to increase the state’s minimum wage from $5.15 an hour to $6.85, Smith said. Polling shows it has wide support, and “it gets the moderate Republicans and independents to say, ‘What has the Republican Party been doing for me?’ It gets them thinking about the party in economic terms instead of social issues.”
It’s so clever it’s positively Clintonesque. And it’s why all eyes are on Colorado in 2006.
So fasten your seat belts. The political season is only getting started.
And it’s sure to be a wild ride.
Diane Carman’s column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. She can be reached at 303-820-1489 or dcarman@denverpost.com.
