With a segment of the country disdainful, if not outright outraged, by established political parties, hearing a defense of the traditional party system can seem both old-fashioned and surprisingly refreshing.
It comes from Judy Bevans, who resigned from the chairmanship of the Vermont Democratic Party in late July. In the face of Vermonters’ rejection of labels and “party affiliation,” and the apparent rise of alternative parties, she places her faith in electing major-party candidates.
These are the parties that have dominated the political scene for most of the nation’s history — with occasional challenges from the left, such as Theodore Roosevelt’s Progressive “Bull Moose” Party of a century ago, and the right, the nativist Know-Nothing Party of the mid-19th century.
In a state in which, as she says, people are likely to say “I vote for the person, not the party, as if they have no party affiliation,” Bevans is a believer in the power of the two-party system in general and the Democratic Party in particular.
“It’s a hard concept to get across that you’re not voting just for the person but for the pressures and the policies” only a group of legislators who belong to the same partisan group can put in play. Bevans believes that only a strong congressional party delegation has the power to say, ‘We’ve got this bill and we’re going to pull together and get it passed.”
Recently, in a post-VDP conversation, Bevans talked about the party’s accomplishments over her two-year tenure. She doesn’t claim direct credit for the biggest achievement — helping to install the party’s gubernatorial candidate, Gov. Peter Shumlin, on the Fifth Floor after three unsuccessful bids to bring down the eight-year reign of Republican Gov. James Douglas — but she cites the importance of her efforts to woo independent voters to the Democratic fold.
With the rise of the voting bloc known as “independents-with-a-small-i” (as opposed to Bernie Sanders’ Independent party-of-one), Bevans argues for the necessity of party affiliation and active engagement with a party. “After all,” she says, “even Bernie has to have help from a party.” (The iconoclastic Independent caucuses with the Democrats.)
Bevans points out that, whether as a “Social Democrat” or “Independent,” Bernie can’t use the Vermont Democratic Party infrastructure, but he still depends on the Democrats for votes, and he does often reciprocate on the campaign trail. Sanders, for example, promoted Peter Shumlin after last year’s five-way Democratic gubernatorial primary. The relationship between the two pols is “cordial and friendly,” she avers. (At any rate, that’s what you might call the party line.)
She took on the VDP chairmanship in March 2009, moving up from vice chair of the party and Orleans County chair. The circumstances were daunting—the party’s major fund-raiser, the David Curtis Dinner, was looming—but she had been vice chair for some time, and because of her statewide experience, she knew her fellow county chairs.
That’s the difference between us and the Republicans. We want people to vote. The Republicans want to make it harder to vote by requiring more pieces of paper, for example.”
– Judy Bevans
Where is her party now? “Financially stronger, financially more secure and more philosophically secure and strong,” she asserts. The coffers are indeed in better shape. When she came on in March 2009, there was under $10,000 in the till. The election year (2010) saw heavy infusions of cash but also the expected heavy cash expenditures. Still, with spending for the first half of the year at $150,000, there was about $100,000 on hand for future expenses, according to the Federal Elections Commission filing records.
With the flusher finances, the party has been able to make new hires and build continuity in the staff, more of whom have greater familiarity with Vermont politics than before. Jesse Bragg, for example, a 2008 graduate of the University of Vermont, was field director during the 2010 campaign before he became the party’s political director and then executive director this year.
There is also a more settled feeling in the office, with a new communications director, Alicia D’Alessandro, and most recently Fauna Shaw hired as finance director. A new field director will be announced shortly.
Among the challenges of Bevans’ tenure was overseeing the clearing up of allegations of financial misconduct that ended with a $2,500 fine from the Federal Elections Commission.
Financial record-keeping is difficult when there is high staff turnover or short-term hires, Bevans said, as there were during the 2008 election and the following six months or so.
“That was nothing unusual,” she says of the muddled records. “It’s complicated. All it takes is one person putting in the FEC data wrong, which can happen when you have high turnover, as we did during the 2008 election cycle. Then it compounds itself. It had to be straightened out, but that’s why we have advisers.”
Last year, primary candidates complained mightily, if off the record, about the condition of the voter files, the most important quid pro quo they feel they get for the levy the state party exacts. While each county organization can do its best to pull together up-to-date voter files, the statewide files that were really launched only in 2000 and owe much to investments made during Howard Dean’s tenure as head of the Democratic National Committee and his 50-state strategy, became an issue.
Bevans said the data are always “in flux,” and that they are always being improved but that “they will always be behind in a rural state like ours.” She says that she hears the same thing at national meetings of state chairs, but adds that in Vermont, with people living in one town but with a post office address or even phone number in another, it’s particularly hard to get a handle on the information. She lauds Dean—“my hero”—because, as she puts it, “ the more information you have, the stronger you are when you are trying to get out the vote.”
VDP Executive Director Jesse Bragg says in the new election cycle a staff member will be dedicated to improving and expanding the statewide voter files. Meanwhile, he and other staff are spending regular time entering the wide range of information into the Voter Activation Network software that, he says, will provide a rich resource for the next campaign. “It’s a case of ‘you get out of it what you put in.’”
Bevans, now in the Development Department of the very small, independent, create-your-own-curriculum Sterling College near her home in Albany, Vt., is elated to be helping young people get on with an education they shape themselves to enable them to do what they care about in life. When I ask her if she thinks she’ll get to know all the students at the college, she laughs and says “I’ve almost met all of the Democrats in the state.”
And she’s still focused on grassroots work. “The Democrats have to get out and remind people what [Peter Shumlin] is doing and why we voted for him. You have to get to people to have them come out and vote. I think early voting is great, because it’s easy to vote when people don’t have to remember to be there on one day when you have to be there by 7 p.m., say.”
Her dander is up by this time in the conversation, and she goes on: “That’s the difference between us and the Republicans. We want people to vote. The Republicans want to make it harder to vote by requiring more pieces of paper, for example.” Having said that, and congratulated the Democrats on doing a very good job of getting people out to vote, she finishes by saying “we are blessed in Vermont by the civility that exists when there’s an election. That’s something we have to protect.”
In September, at the next scheduled state party meeting, the new chair will be elected. As no one else has stepped forward, Acting Chair—and former Chittenden County Chair — Jake Perkinson is expected to become party chair. His experience as a lawyer whose practice includes campaign finance and election law should come in handy.
And Judy Bevans? “I’m heart and soul an organizer,” the ex-chair allows. That means she’s already working with the Orleans County Committee on a Democratic Party presence at the Orleans County Fair in Barton this month.
