This commentary is by Carter Neubieser of Burlington, a Ward 1 Neighborhood Planning Assembly steering committee member and a member of the Vermont Progressive Party.
As a politically active community member in my mid-to-late 20s, I’m passionate about involving young people in the political process. Whether it’s sending texts reminding friends to vote, asking someone late on a Saturday night to email their representative about a bill, or dropping campaign literature in my neighborhood, I am that “annoying” friend asking my peers to get active.
Unfortunately, more often than not, I hear a deep cynicism in people’s responses along the lines of, “Why participate when insiders have already determined the outcome?”
In some respects, my more cynical peers are correct. The wealthy and well-connected have an outsized influence over who benefits from legislation, who wins elections, and whose voice is heard by decision-makers — there are an endless number of examples of this. Even in Vermont, this is true.
Through my work at advocacy organizations and with the Progressive Party, I am gaining a deeper understanding of how the Vermont Statehouse operates, and at times it can be incredibly disheartening.
Anyone who wants to vote against the will of Democratic House leadership can expect to be pressured. That can look like changing committee assignments to areas not relevant to someone’s expertise, leadership fielding a candidate against you in a primary, or leadership preventing legislation you worked on from moving forward.
Usually, without a counterbalance, like hearing from constituents, these tactics work. Lawmakers are faced with a tough choice — stick to their values and risk not being able to do their jobs effectively, or cave to the pressure and vote for something they don’t believe in or think their constituents don’t support, in hopes of being able to advance issues they care about later on.
But there is reason to be hopeful. The story of an elections reform bill (H.429) this past session shows that people’s voices can still determine policy outcomes in Vermont.
After leaving committee, H.429 was headed for a floor vote in the Vermont House of Representatives with provisions that:
● Raised the limit for a contribution made between a political party and candidate from $10,000 to $100,000 (originally it was proposed to be unlimited).
● Restricted a candidate’s ability to choose which party to identify with after winning the nomination of more than one political party.
● Eliminated the ability of a candidate to run in a general election if they lost any party’s primary, either as an independent or as the nominee of another party.
In short, this bill would have limited voters’ choices, increased the amount of money in politics, and favored Democrats over Progressives, independents and Republicans.
When I heard about this bill, I was shocked. Was the party in power really going to pass election law that favored them over their opponents? I had thought that happened only nationally or in other states.
Over the course of a few days, because of the work of organizations like the Vermont Progressive Party, Rights and Democracy, the Vermont AFL-CIO and others, hundreds of calls and emails flooded lawmakers. In a matter of days, the political calculation of this power grab fundamentally shifted for Democratic leadership. This bill wasn’t going to move forward without public scrutiny, potential media coverage, and ultimately serious political cost.
With support from only part of one party, newly bruised egos, and the possibility of defeat looming, House leadership caved and compromised. H.429 passed the House with many of the worst provisions stripped out and others watered down. When it came to the Senate, the bill was slightly watered down further and was sent back to committee during this June’s veto session — a way of killing the bill without claiming outright defeat. For now, this bill will not move forward.
The saga of H.429 is a powerful reminder that, as constituents, our voices and participation still matter in our democracy.
Representatives aren’t elected to represent lobbyists, special interests or political parties — they are elected to represent us, the people. When they forget that, or we forget that, bad policy is passed.
Democracy can be messy, but it’s by far the most effective system of government. For it to work, we, the people, need to actively and consistently engage. That might look different for everyone, depending on your skills or passions, but H.429 proves how important it is to find ways that feel right for you to participate. Because what you do does matter, and it can change the course of policy for the better.
