Partisan Presidential Primary Elections. Legislative Initiative Amendment.
	Argument in Favor of Proposition 3

PROPOSITION 3 MUST BE APPROVED AND ENACTED at this statewide election--otherwise California voters will NOT be allowed to participate in the Year 2000 national presidential nominating process.

Without Proposition 3 , California voters will have their VOTING POWER STRIPPED AWAY! California voters will NOT be allowed to help select their own political parties' presidential nominees even though voters from the OTHER 49 states will participate. The California delegation, which helps select the presidential nominees, will be arbitrarily selected by BACKROOM POLITICIANS instead of by primary voters in a regulated process. This is true for California's Democrats, Republicans and members of other political parties! THE UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT HAS SAID SO!

Proposition 3 would enact the SAVE THE PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY ACT OF 1998--fixing an unintended error contained in California's open primary law. Proposition 3 FIXES this error!

If Proposition 3 is enacted, California voters will STILL be able to cast primary votes for any party's candidates for U.S. senator, congressman, governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, state senator or state assemblymember.

The national Democratic, Republican and other political parties have rules which prohibit them from accepting convention delegations elected in open primary states. Why? Because the convention delegates do more than just nominate presidential candidates--they also write all the national party rules and elect the national chairs of their own parties. The United States Supreme Court has ruled that national political parties may refuse, according to their own rules, to seat delegations from open-primary states at the parties' national presidential nominating conventions.

Proposition 3 would bring California state law into conformity with Democratic and Republican National Committee rules and regulations. Specifically, it would allow California primary voters to vote only for presidential delegates from the political party in which the voters are registered members. Presidential delegate selection would be treated the same way the Open Primary Act currently treats election of county central committee representatives.

Surveys show that most California voters wrongly believe that they are voting for the candidate when they vote in a presidential primary. In all 50 states primary voters are NOT voting for the candidate--but actually are voting for a long slate of delegates pledged to that candidate. The lists of delegates are maintained at the Secretary of State's office and your county registrar of voters. Each presidential candidate has a unique list of pledged delegates. That pledged delegation which gets the most votes goes to the party's national nominating convention to join with the delegations from the other states to help select the party's presidential nominee.

Join Democratic Senate President Pro Tempore John Burton, Senate Republican Leader Ross Johnson, Democratic Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa, and Assembly Republican Leader Bill Leonard in protecting the right of Californians to participate in national political party nominations for president. Vote YES on Proposition 3.

JOHN R. LEWIS
Senator, Orange County JOHN L. BURTON
Senate President Pro Tempore, San Francisco BRUCE HERSCHENSOHN