We can expect in the coming days, when the Utah Legislature opens its annual session, the traditional pledge by leadership to proceed in a spirit of bipartisan compromise. But this year, as in most in the recent past, that promise will ring hollow — not because leaders are insincere or in some way disingenuous, but because of simple math. The legislative makeup is one part Democrat to six parts Republican. Two-party negotiation simply isn’t necessary to get laws passed or policy changed, and in a lot of ways, that’s too bad.
For one, it isn’t representative of the state’s political disposition. In the 2014 elections, Democrats received 30 percent of all votes cast. In the Legislature, Democrats hold 16 percent of the seats. The lopsidedness has led to an intrinsic one-sidedness in virtually all policy areas. The GOP has amassed such a numerical juggernaut that the party’s agenda is able to steamroll its way where it wants, with only an occasional pause to take notice of other possible routes.
It also has bred an attitude that might be harsh to label as “arrogant” but that certainly falls into the category of “highly self-assured.” Witness the propensity to debate and essentially decide key policy items in closed Republican caucuses, something a coalition of media outlets, including the Deseret News, has formally condemned in a recent call for more openness in legislative proceedings.
The GOP insists closed caucuses are not injurious to legislative transparency, which is at least a little bit delusional given the definition of transparency. But people bound together in a group with unfettered power are often able to delude themselves about many things and proceed with the confidence of group approbation. This is not healthy for the democratic process.
Democrats like to complain about gerrymandering and efforts to manipulate legislative seating by tinkering with district boundaries. While we too share concerns about gerrymandering, we should point out that the 2012 redistricting measure that created the current legislative map passed both the House and Senate with unanimous votes. The truth is that population in Utah is dispersed in such a way that there are few precincts that can be described as Democratic strongholds, and nearly all of them are in Salt Lake County. In Davis and Utah counties, even the House districts with the largest number of Democrats are still solidly Republican.
The situation is what it is, and isn’t likely to change soon. In the meantime, and especially during the upcoming session, Republicans will be wise to remember that their constituency extends beyond their individual districts to the interests of the entire population. A large number of Utahns, by party affiliation, are under-represented in the halls of the Legislature. It is in the interest of all citizens, and in the service of good government, that the majority chooses to act in a spirit of beneficence and openness.