The elimination of the right and opportunity of democratic choice in the
United States is simply not tolerable. The Democratic and Republican
officeholders are responsible for this condition. They are the
beneficiaries of the abuses which they and their predecessors created.
They promote the propaganda that would blind the public to the loss of
the public's right of democratic choice. They promote the hypocritical
concept that while they clearly are part of the legislative process
creating the abuse, they are without any personal responsibility for the
consequences of this process.
The Solutions of the Independence Party:
The Independence Party is committed to the concept that voters have
an inherent right to a democratic choice in all their elections, and
that the only way to guarantee that right is to insure that challengers
have relatively equal access to resources. Further, the Party believes
that the voters themselves must be empowered to resist a legislature
that has proven unresponsive to the public will. Toward these ends, we
support the following measures.
To Increase the Power of Voters:
1. Initiative, Referendum and Recall: Commitment to Initiative,
Referendum and Recall at the federal, state and local level.
2. Referendum on the State Budget: Commitment to a state-wide referendum
on a two year state budget. (See Fiscal proposals on budget reform).
3. Voter Nonapproval Proposal: Place a category on the ballot that
allows citizens to vote "None of the Above." If this category
wins, a special election must be held.
4. Citizen Empowerment Plank: Grant legal "standing" to
citizens and citizen groups to bring court challenges for waste, fraud,
financial abuse, and criminal acts at all levels of government.
Eliminate sovereign immunity as a defense against such actions.
5. Unrestricted Party Registration: Commitment to the right of citizens
to register as a member of any party of their choice, at any time,
without prohibition by the state.
Enhance the Potential for Voter Participation:
1. Motor Voter Plank: Automatically register individuals to vote who
have a driver's license, are eighteen (18), and who are otherwise
qualified to vote.
2. Extended Polling Times: Hold elections in a manner so as to allow
voters the opportunity to vote during a period beginning on the Saturday
before the traditional Tuesday date for elections and ending on election
day, and expand the opportunity for absentee voting.
Improve Ballot Access to People or Groups Seeking Office:
1. Uniform Ballot Access Plank: Support the creation of uniform
ballot access for elections for President, the US Senate and the House
of Representatives, easing access for independent or other party
candidates.
2. State-wide Ballot Access: A measure whereby a state-wide ballot
position as a party could be obtained either by running a candidate for
governor who receives 50,000 votes in the general election, or by
registering 50,000 voters under the name of the party state-wide.
3. Local Ballot Access: A measure whereby any political organizing
committee securing the registration of one percent of the registered
voters in any electoral district would have the right to place
candidates on the ballot as a major party in that district as long as
they maintain the one percent registration.
Reduce the Advantages of Incumbency and Grant Challengers Relatively
Equal Ability to Compete for Office:
1. Term limits: Support term limits of no more than twelve (12) years
for a legislative position and eight (8) years for an executive
position.
2. Extension of Terms: Support the extension of Congressional and state
legislative terms to four (4) years (thereby reducing the need for
continuous campaigning and the need for campaign funds).
3. Public Funding of Campaigns: Commitment to public funding of
elections, coupled with the complete elimination of Political Action
Committee (PAC) money for local, state and federal offices. Candidates
accepting public funds cannot accept any funds or services for the
general election from party organizations (the so-called soft money),
and they must accept funding limits for their campaign, with unused
campaign funds returned to the government.
4. Local Funding of Campaigns: Restrict fund raising so that at least
eighty (80) percent of campaign funds for primaries come from within the
area where the candidates live.
5. No Foreign Campaign Contributions: Support for legislation declaring
illegal campaign contributions by foreign governments or foreign owned
corporations or other organizations.
6. Reform of the Franking Laws: (1) Prohibit an incumbent from any
mailings at public expense after August 31st of an election year. (2)
Prohibit any franked mass mailings by incumbents to voters outside of
the district in which the incumbent serves. (3) Extend the franking
privilege to political parties of record whereby these political parties
get mailings equal to the number made by the incumbent during any
election year. (4) Remove the incumbent's name and picture from any
newsletter sent to constituencies using the franking privilege.
7. Anti-Gerrymandering Plank: Conduct the ten year redistricting through
an independent commission where commission members are nominated by the
Governor and must be confirmed by a two-thirds in both houses of the
legislature. Members must be appointed in the year prior to the census
year. At lease one member must come from each political party with
state-wide ballot status in the state. Redistricting must be completed
before the end of the first year in which the census is completed.
Should any of these provisions not be met by the legislator and the
governor, the power to take action falls immediately to the Court of
Appeals.
8. Uniform Disclosure Plank: Support a proposal requiring the clear
disclosure of any organization soliciting support on behalf of a
candidate, whether in person or by phone.
9. Media Time For Debates: We support in principle the belief that radio
and television, as publicly licensed broadcasters, should be required to
set aside some set number of programming hours to support debates among
the candidates for the various offices.
Improve Dramatically the Ethical Standards and Conduct of candidates
and Office Holders.
1. Party Standards for Candidates: The Independence Party imposes
certain standards on its candidates. These Include: (1) they will accept
no PAC funds; (2) they voluntarily accept term limits on themselves even
before they are enacted into law; (3) they will strive to avoid negative
campaigning, and will strive to conduct their campaigns in a manner that
sticks to issues, educates voters, and raises the quality of discourse
in campaigns; (4) they agree to participate in debates; (5) they agree
to participate in a balanced and fair process of reviewing complaints
against unfair, inaccurate, and misleading campaign practices on a
timely basis.
2. Requirement to Caucus as a Party: Independence Party candidates
agree, when elected, to caucus as members of the Independence Party.
3. Fair Campaign Practices Commission: The party supports the creation
of local and state commissions to review campaign complaints.
4. Anti-Gratuity Plank: Independence Party candidates will refuse all
gifts or gratuities from lobbyists or other private interests seeking
services, favors, or legislation from the local, state or federal
government in which they serve.
5. Anti-Revolving Door Plank: Support legislation such that office
holders will not serve as lobbyists with the state or federal government
within three (3) years of the date of termination of their service from
their respective office, and they will not represent, before the state
or federal government, any foreign government or corporation (or an
American subsidiary) for a period of five years beyond the end of their
government service.
Improve Opportunities for Citizen-Legislators:
1. Citizen Legislator Plank: Restructure legislative service to
support the concept that all legislative offices, other than the House
and the US. Senate should be part-time positions that can easily be held
by most citizens.
2. Legislative Salaries: End the policy of granting pensions to elected
legislative positions.
3. Legislative Reform: Make the state budget a two year budget cutting
the legislative year to two months and cutting salaries by 50 percent.
4. Uniform Application of Laws: support legislation that would make
Congress and the state legislature, and the members of both, subject to
the same laws imposed on others, including pension laws, discrimination
laws, etc.
5. Budget Penalty: Reduce the salaries of state legislators and the
Governor by $1,000 for every day the budget is late in delivery.
The battle to restore democratic choice, electoral accountability and
ethical behavior is paramount. Unless these reforms can occur, it is
impossible to institute budget and fiscal reforms because the system of
funding now in place creates overwhelming pressures to increase
government spending.
The most important reform of the Independence Party, however, is the
party's very existence. The Party will contest the seats where one of
the other two parties has decided that the incumbent cannot be
contested. The Party will seek to finance itself from among its own
members, and thereby present the choice of a locally funded candidate
against a candidate beholden to special interests and interests outside
the district. In this manner, the Independence Party will alter the
present stalemate in politics and increase the choices available to the
voter.
The Restoration of Fiscal Solvency And Budgetary Sanity
The Current Condition:
The profligate fiscal behavior of the incumbents of both parties has
reached proportions over the past decade that clearly threaten to
destroy the future for our children and grandchildren. The federal debt
stands in excess of $4.5 Trillion, and it will rise nearly another
Trillion before the end of the 1990's. This does not include the
enormous underfunded liabilities in virtually all of the long term
programs such as Medicaid, Medicare, and federal, state and local
pensions. These underfundings occur because state and federal
authorities deliberately understate the financial implications of
long-term obligations by using actuarial tables that are well out of
date. This allows them to avoid paying for these obligations with
current dollars, which might require tax increases, and instead they
transfer the obligations to future generations of tax payers. In New
York State in 1993, the Governor and the leaders of the state
legislature (both Republican and Democrat) increased this underfunding
of pensions by an additional $3 Billion, in order to produce a temporary
balance of the state budget. They were sued by the Controller and lost,
and now the taxpayers must make up this additional amount.
We cannot recount all of the fiscal and budgetary abuses in this short
document. The abuses are available in more than two dozen books that
have been written about this behavior during the past five years alone.
What we can say is that these abuses are the direct product of
agreements between the leadership of both political parties. At the
federal level, the leaders of the two parties have produced three
massive tax increases in less than a decade, 1986, 1990 and 1993; and in
all three instances they have done little or nothing to control spending
or to alter the forces that are driving spending upward. The Republicans
pretend to believe in fiscal conservatism, but they have been directly
supportive of all but the last agreement. Under the direct leadership of
both parties, the rise in federal spending continues unabated and
untouched by the actions of Congress or the President.
In New York State the problem is even worse. The Republicans have
controlled the State Senate and the Democrats the Assembly for nearly
three decades. During that time, particularly since 1980, state spending
has risen at an average of two to three times the inflation index. The
continuation of this practice for another ten years will prove
catastrophic for the State. Again, the Republican leadership pretends to
fiscal conservatism, but this spending increase could not have occurred
without their explicit agreement through their control of the State
Senate.
During the whole time, both parties have spent hundreds of millions of
dollars in propaganda to persuade Americans and New Yorkers that they
are fiscally prudent and responsible. The incumbents of both parties
routinely return to their home districts and pretend that they bear no
responsibility for institutions that no longer function to serve the
public will.
The facts are today not even in serious dispute: (1) Spending remains
out of control at the state and federal level; (2) Both major parties
contribute to the problem because of their need to pay off interests
that support their candidates; (3) Both parties contribute to hiding the
problem from the public through the use of phony budgets, gimmicks such
as off-line budgeting, the deliberate understatement of long-term
liabilities, and mandates to transfer the cost either to other units of
government, to the private sector through regulations and requirements,
or to the future.
The time is long since past that a responsible person can believe that
either party will step forward with real solutions to these problems.
These incumbents will not bite the hands that feed money into their
elections through the corruption of the PAC system and the soft money
transfer through the national and state committee of the two parties.
The Solutions of the Independence Party
We believe that the restoration of democratic choice in elections and
direct electoral accountability are the surest ways to restore fiscal
and budgetary responsibility. However, we also believe that
institutional reforms are required to sweep away the residue of
corruption and incompetence that permeates the budgetary process in New
York and the nation. Budgetary and fiscal policies in the United States
should be guided by a number of principles: 1. Continued deficit
spending and underfunding of obligations are unacceptable.
2. Federal, state, and local governmental budgets should be subject to
the same accounting principles and processes imposed wisely on private
corporations and organizations.
3. Our policy should call for the reduction of the deficit to zero
before the end of the decade, and it should include a gradual paydown of
all long-term obligations.
4. All long-term obligations must be funded with current dollars,
applying accepted actuarial figures to every public pension program and
other long term obligations under the authority and guidance of an
independent accounting firm.
5. Wherever possible, we prefer to minimize the role of the government,
transferring needed activities into the private sector through
privatization.
6. When a government program transfers income to individuals, we prefer
to minimize the size and scope of administrative and bureaucratic
involvement, making such transfer payments directly without excessive
interference in the lives of recipients.
The first obligation of all obligation of all governments is to prove
that they can provide services with a level of quality that meet the
needs and standards of performance required by the taxpaying public. So
far, governments have fallen terribly short of acceptable quality in
areas where direct comparisons with the private delivery of similar
services is possible. For example, would Americans, where they have a
choice, prefer to get their medical care through the Veterans
Administration Hospitals or go to a private hospital. Would businesses
prefer to trust their packages to the Post Office or to one of the
private carriers?
We believe that the time has arrived for government at all levels to
concentrate more on improving the quality of services they provide
rather than throwing more money at services that are not performing
well. While we as a party do not follow the rather mindless cant of some
Republicans who decry all government; we equally reject the bureaucratic
liberals in the Democratic Party who with similar mindlessness propose
monstrous new program after new program as a cure for all of our
problems, even as they fail to make the existing programs work. In this
light, the solutions of the Independence Party of New York include the
following:
Decrease Federal and State Budget Deficits to Zero In Five Years.
1. Federal Deficit Plank: A five year plan to reduce the federal
deficit to zero that emphasizes exclusively spending cuts since federal
taxes have already been raised twice in 1990 and 1993 with no real
spending cuts.
2. Automatic Cost of Living (COLA) adjustments: An end to the use of
automatic (without legislative vote) cost of living adjustments for all
government programs. (Periodic cost of living adjustments will obviously
be necessary from time to time, but legislatures should be forced to
vote on these increases).
3. National Debt Referendum Plank: Require a national referendum on the
increase of the federal debt level except where approved by a two-thirds
vote of both houses of Congress and signed by the President.
4. Restraint in Growth of Government Plank: Call for a five year program
of holding the rate of increase in state and federal spending to at
least one percent under the rate of inflation for five years.
5. Full Funding Plank: Support an end to the deliberate unfunding and
underfunding of long-term liabilities such as government employee
pensions. Require that expenses and obligations be fully paid in the
year in which the obligation occurs.
6. State Deficit Plan: Call for a five year plan to eliminate the
growing state budget deficit, demanding that the budget is current with
all long-term liabilities and obligations.
7. Anti-Mandate Plank: Require an end to all mandates which transfer
revenue obligations to other units of government without the approval of
the other governments or the citizens they represent.
8. Sunset Provisions: Require a five year sunset provision for every
budget item, both at the state and federal level, whereby the program
must be fully reconstituted through the legislative process.
9. Balanced Budget Amendment: Support a constitutional amendment to
provide for a balanced federal budget.
10. Full Taxation of Subsidies: All subsidies and transfer payments of
any kind that go directly to corporations and individuals should be
taxed at the prevailing rate for the corporation or taxpayer.
Improve the Fairness and Quality of The Budgetary Process:
1. Full and Fair accounting Plank: Support the use of generally
recognized accounting standards and procedures to federal, state and
local governments, including: (1) The use of the accrual method of
accounting; (2) The inclusion of a balance sheet with a full expression
of all assets and obligations; (3) The creation of public audit
committees: (4) The requirement of an annual outside audit by an
independent auditing firm: (5) The end to the use of off-line budgeting:
(6) The requirement for independent actuarial evaluations of all
long-term program obligations; (7) The adoption of a single set of
accounting procedures and standards; and (8) Quarterly interim reports
on the budget.
2. Secure Trust Fund Status for Social Security: An end to the practice
of financing current debt by taking excess Social Security contributions
and replacing them with government IOUs.
3. Two Year Budget Cycle: Require that all government budgeting replace
the current one year budgets with two year budgets, requiring public
referenda on these budgets.
4. Citizen Approval of Employment Contracts: Provide public referenda on
all state and local public employment contracts. 5. Taxpayer Advocacy
Plank: Create an independent Taxpayer Budget Office under the authority
of the Controller, whose legislative function is to prepare the best
possible case against every public expenditure and every increase in
public expenditures, and which is required to make representations
before legislative committees on behalf of the taxpayer.]
6. Timely Budgets: Both the state and federal governments should be
required to submit final budgets within timely schedules, with fines for
the legislator if they fail to meet deadlines.
Improve the Quality of Service of the Government:
1. Fair Dismissal Plank: Continue Civil Service requirements for the
hiring and promotion of public employees, but alter the Civil Service
requirements to ease dramatically the restrictions (and exorbitant cost)
of the ability of the government to discharge employees for cause.
2. Privatization Plank: Support an aggressive program, of privatizing
government functions wherever and whenever possible.
3. Quality Measurement Plank: Require measurement of the quality of the
delivery of all public services by those who use those public services
on at least an annual basis, with full disclosure of the results.
4. Line Item Veto: Extend the line item veto to the Governor and the
President.
5. Citizen Legislator Plank: Support the concept that all legislative
offices other than Congress and the U.S. Senate should be part-time
positions that can easily be held by most citizens, and we support the
reorganization of the legislative sessions in New York toward that end.
6. Uniform Application of Laws Plank: Support a measure requiring that
members of Congress and the state legislatures be subject to the same
laws that are applicable to others, including laws about discrimination,
pension reform and the like.
The deficit and spending crises in this country cannot be addressed
unless a third force is inserted in the legislatures to force the two
parties to end the destructive stalemates over taxation and spending.
The Independence Party intends to create that force by electing enough
legislators to deny either party the ability to organize the legislature
without our votes. The members of the party will vote for fiscal
responsibility, reform of the budgetary process, and the permanent
elimination of deficit financing.
Strengthen the Family Structure
The Current Condition: Welfare
The deterioration of the family in American life is the product of
many forces, some of which are outside of the ability of the government
to control. However, government policy, itself, should not be one of the
primary forces that undermines the preservation and maintenance of
healthy families. The problem, of course, is that government policy,
especially the welfare system in all of its dimensions, is one of the
primary agents behind the deterioration of families in the inner cities
across the United States.
The current welfare system is the creation of both the Republican and
Democratic parties, and both parties have been loath to reform this area
of policy, despite the near uniform agreement that the welfare system,
as designed: (1) encourages the creation of a dependent class of
citizens, wards of the state for multiple generations, (2) encourages
fathers to leave their families because it is more economically
profitable for the family if they do, (3) encourages teenagers to have
children out of wedlock because the state enables these children to
leave home when the baby is born, (4) and fosters the growth of values
formed by peer groups rather than parents, fostering violence,
disruption, and mayhem destroying the security and safety of family
members and neighbors.
Moreover, the current welfare system has produced a huge bureaucracy
that absorbs a disproportionate share of financial resources, estimated
at 68 cents out of the dollar. The amount of money currently spent on
the various welfare programs would completely eliminate poverty if the
money was simply given to the poor.
The Independence Party has no ability at this time to rewrite all of the
very specific provisions of the laws that govern the welfare system
broadly defined. At the same time, we believe that voters have a right
to understand the principles that would guide such an overhaul of the
welfare system, if the Independence Party were responsible for the
system.
Further, we believe that the educational system is the greatest agency
for creating equality of opportunity in the United States, and the
enhancement of the educational system in that role is a key factor in
strengthening the prosperity and future for our children.
Completely Overhaul the Welfare System.
The Values promoted by the current welfare system are incompatible
with the larger goal of strengthening the family. We believe that the
welfare system must be completely overhauled to promote the following
values.
1. Work and Not Dependency: To require and encourage "work"
and not "inactivity" on the part of income recipients, ending
permanent "welfare dependency" except for the seriously
impaired and disabled.
2. Keeping Families Together: To encourage, rather than discourage,
fathers to stay with their families, assuming in the process financial
responsibility for their children.
3. End Teenage Pregnancy: To discourage teenage pregnancy, and to
discourage the current practice of children trying to raise children of
their own.
4. Tame the Welfare Bureaucracy: To reduce the size, scope and power of
the welfare bureaucracy, providing the money for reform out of the
exorbitant overhead costs of the current welfare system.
5. Parental Support: Take steps to insure that both biological parents
contribute to the support of children by strengthening the state and
federal government's ability to assist in enforcing children support
orders and child support agreed upon by the parents.
6. IRS Cooperation: Remove barriers to permitting the IRS to divulge the
whereabouts of non paying parents to appropriate state and federal
agencies.
7. Residency Requirements: One year residency requirement in New York
State before one can receive welfare assistance.
8. Illegal Aliens: No welfare assistance to people who are illegal
aliens.
9. Federal Waivers: Request federal legislative waivers so that New York
can change its welfare system without explicit federal approval. The
Independence Party clearly rejects the approaches of both the Democratic
and the Republican Parties on the issue of welfare. The Democrats insist
on reforms that leave the entire welfare bureaucracy intact,
perpetuating the agency most responsible for resisting changes that
would reduce its power. The Republicans, by contrast, promote solutions
that are largely propaganda, knowing full well that they will never be
responsible for implementing their positions in most areas of the
country. The Independence Party acknowledges the continuing need for a
safety net to protect citizens, but we believe that the system needs a
complete overhaul.
The Current Condition: Education
The American educational system is the single most important force
for upward mobility and economic prosperity in the United States. The
improvement of the current system of education is a central objective of
the Independence Party. Toward that overall mission, the Party has
several specific objectives.
To Improve Productivity in Education in the United States and New
York State.
1. Support Capital Intensive Technologies: Create and fund research
and development efforts aimed at bringing capital intensive technologies
into classroom teaching, including computers, interactive video,
educational software, multi-media, etc.
2. National Science Act for Americans: Create and fund a national
science and technology act that will create educational funds for
American citizens who study in the sciences, engineering, and
mathematics fields.
3. National Prize Program: Create a national prize program for the
development of computer based educational tools and materials for the
schools.
4. Schools as Community Centers: Provide funding to keep schools open on
evenings, during weekends, and in the summers as community centers for
our youth.
5. Extension of Education: Extend the school year and the school day.
Increase the Choices Available to Parents and Their Children for
Their Education:
1. Enhanced Choice: Provide funding for children who wish to seek
education outside of the district in which they reside.
2. Enhance Competition: Allow parents to use public funding to send
their children to qualified private schools.
3. Early Education: Increase state and federal support for early
education, particularly for children who come from the impoverished
backgrounds.
Make the Restoration of Order, Discipline, and Safety in the
Classroom a High Priority, Even at the Expense of Isolating Students Who
are Disruptive in the School.
1. Increased Authority: Grant principals and schools districts
greater ability to expel unruly students.
2. Weapon Suspension: Immediately suspend students who bring guns or
knives to school.
3. Bureaucratic Reduction: Reduce central bureaucratic control,
including state control, over individual districts and individual
schools; thereby reducing the ability of large scale state and local
interests to dictate school policies.
The educational system in New York State is filled with fine people who
want nothing more than to make the system work more efficiently and more
effectively for our children. These people are hampered by model of
education where large scale bureaucratic control is exerted downward
from the state, creating rigidity and inflexibility throughout the
system. We believe that the children in the State would be much better
off if parents had more influence and bureaucrats less influence in
determining the education that our children receive. Continuous
improvement should be the guiding light of education, but improvements
determined by the needs of families, children and parents, and not the
needs of the other interests in education. Education primarily exists to
serve the needs and interests of the consumers, and not the needs and
interests of the providers. The current organization of education in the
State reverses this priority.
The Problem of Crime
The Current Condition:
Crime is a central issue threatening the family in New York State.
The statistics on the rising wave of violent crime appall those who
remember a time when our communities were relatively safe from violence.
Neither the Republican Party nor the Democratic Party are in favor of
crime, and neither the Republicans nor the Democrats want to be
perceived as soft on crime. If either of the two parties had a
"magic bullet" that would cure this problem, we would have
heard about it long ago. The reality is that neither party has proposed
anything that approaches a solution to this problem, and both parties
and their candidates are periodically guilty of absurd propaganda
against the other in the pursuit of electoral advantage on this issue.
Principles of the Independence Party
The Independence Party has not yet developed a full blown set of
positions on the issue of crime, but we can enunciate some principles
that will guide the development of these proposals over the next few
months:
