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Feb 1, 2003 5:02 pm US/Eastern
(AP) (ALBANY) Leaders of the state's Ross Perot-inspired Independence Party on Saturday overwhelmingly voted to open their statewide primaries to all non-enrolled voters.
Party Chairman Frank MacKay said the proposal would allow almost 2.5 million so-called independents to vote in Independence primaries, for statewide offices such as governor.
"It's long overdue. We want to reach out to these true independents," MacKay said. "They're certainly welcome to join the party but that's not our agenda. Our goal is to give unaffiliated voters a place to go on primary day."
The party's state committee voted 144-6 for the proposal. Three members voted in absentia.
MacKay also said he expected it would take a federal court lawsuit to get the change implemented.
That is because the state Board of Elections has said state law requires voters to be members of a political party if they wish to vote in its primaries.
"They're wrong and we're willing to go to court to prove they are wrong," MacKay said, noting that a 1986 U.S. Supreme Court ruling allowed Connecticut's Republican Party to open its primaries to non-enrolled voters. Parties in several other states have also opened their primaries to non-party members.
"We're not reinventing the wheel here," the party chairman said. "Shame on anyone for trying to stop 2.5 million people from being invited into a political party primary."
While the Independence Party could seek to change state law, there seemed little likelihood of success on that front given the reaction of state Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a Democrat, when MacKay broached the notion late last year.
"Those who want to participate in a particular party's selection of candidates should enroll in that party," Silver had said.
Opening the Independence Party primaries to non-enrolled voters could, of course, generate more interest in it.
It might also make it easier for MacKay and other party leaders to deliver their nomination to major party candidates.
Unlike most other states, New York allows major party candidates to also run on minor party ballot lines and count votes won there.
Last year, MacKay and other Independence Party leaders sought to hand the party's nomination to Republican Gov. George Pataki as part of his successful bid for a third term.
That plan was upset by billionaire B. Thomas Golisano, the Rochester-based businessman who co-founded the New York party and had been its unsuccessful candidate twice previously for governor.
On Sept. 10, 2002, Golisano beat Pataki in an Independence Party primary that was only open to its 260,000 enrolled members. Golisano got 9,572 votes to Pataki's 9,076.
In the general election, Pataki easily won a third term over Democratic challenger H. Carl McCall. For a third time, Golisano finished a distant third.
MacKay hopes that getting non-affiliated voters involved in the Independence Party primaries would lead some of them into enrolling.
Of the state's 11.2 million registered voters, 5.3 million are Democrats and 3.1 million are Republicans. Almost 2.3 million are not enrolled in a political party, according to the state Board of Elections.
(© 2003 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. )
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