STATE PRIMARY RULES STRIKE OUT ON SIMPLIFICATION.

Byline: Conny McCormack

VOTING rules for California's primary election on Tuesday may leave many allowed to vote for candidates of other political parties in the primary voters shaking their heads. To see just how well you understand your political party choices, I challenge you to take the following election day quiz:

1. All registered voters, regardless of political party affiliation, are election. True or False?

2. Voters registered as nonpartisan (independent) may choose to vote on the primary ballot for either the Democratic, Republican or American Independent parties but not for the Green, Libertarian, Natural Law or Peace and Freedom parties. True or False?

3. If a nonpartisan voter chooses to vote on a Democratic ballot, he/she is entitled to vote on the Democratic contests for president and all other Democratic contests with the exception of County Central Committee. However, if the same nonpartisan voter chooses to vote on a Republican ballot, he/she is prohibited from voting on the presidential contest as well as the County Central Committee but may vote on other Republican contests (such as Congress, State Senate, Assembly, etc.). True or False?

Answers:

1. False. It used to be true, and was the case in the last presidential primary election in March 2000. But not anymore.

2. True.

3. True.

These confounding primary election rules more closely resemble a ``Who's on First?'' comedy routine than the rational decisions made by the state Legislature. Following is a quick review of how and why this convoluted primary election format evolved:

Prior to and including 1996, California's primaries were closed elections. Only voters registered with a political party were eligible to choose that party's nominees; nonpartisan voters were limited to voting on ballot propositions and nonpartisan offices.

In 1998 and 2000 California's primary was changed by initiative to a wide open or blanket format in which all registered voters could pick and choose from among any of the political parties' candidates just as they do in November general elections.

While voters liked the wide open primary, political parties did not. The parties sued. The lawsuit went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which in July 2000 sided with the political parties, declaring California's blanket primary format unconstitutional.

However, the number of political party registrants has been steadily declining for decades while nonaffiliated or nonpartisan registrants have swelled to more than 15 percent of the state's voters. The political parties, wanting to tap into this huge reservoir of voters, persuaded the California Legislature to enact a modified closed primary election format shortly after the Supreme Court decision. County registrars of voters jokingly refer to it as the ``slightly ajar'' primary format because it is neither open nor closed.

In retrospect, what seemed like a simple solution - allowing the political parties to decide if they want nonpartisan registrants to participate in their primary elections - has turned into a complicated fiasco.

Some of the state's seven political parties said ``OK'' to nonpartisans participating, others said ``no way,'' while the two major political parties chose a ``maybe,'' splitting on whether or not to allow nonpartisans to vote on the presidential contest!

Unfortunately, the complex ``slightly ajar'' primary format may result in voter and poll worker confusion and a heightened potential for error when poll workers try to determine which of the political party ballots to hand to each voter on Tuesday.

Perhaps it is time for the Legislature to take another look at the primary election rules. The process needs to be simplified for the sake of the voters and the poll workers who volunteer their service.