Cabarrus Cheap Seats

In “Let’s Talk About Cabarrus Politics”, Harold Smith’s magum opus, he covers a lot of ground. Out of all of the outrageous claims and scapegoating, the most frightening statement is the following in his “Action Plan” section:

Action two is to select the candidates who meet our criteria. I will ask the Executive Committee to come up with the criteria and make the selections.Action three is to support the selected candidates both financially and with campaign strategies. The Cabarrus Republican Men’s Club now has the ability to give financial support to local and state candidates. We have followed the guidance of the General Council of NC Republican Party and are properly registered with the NC State Board of Elections.

Action four is to work to get these candidates elected.

Here’s the deal: most of the people Harold Smith has a problem with are Republicans. He even ran against the current leadership of the Republican Party this year. He called the current leadership “liberals with a tax and spend agenda”. He was overwhelmingly defeated at the 2005 County Convention. He followed that up by working with Coy Privette to take over the Republican Men’s Club. So, the only way to get the people in office that they want are to take charge during the primary and non-partisan elections. This poses a bit of a problem since the Cabarrus County Republican Party is a political party - not a machine; and, clearly, Harold Smith is proposing setting up a machine to put people of his ilk in office.

Most people know machine politics as the classic “smoke filled room”. For the sake of this discussion, that image will do just fine. The questions the reader should ask are “How would a modern machine be different from the current system?” and “What’s the position of the Republican Party on this sort of thing?”

First Question: How would a modern machine be different from the current system?

Machine politics was prevalent earlier in the American history. Many of us learned about the Pendergast machine, Tammany Hall, and Daley. Basically, the machine controlled who got jobs and contracts within the government in exchange for votes and other political favors. Many laws and government policies prohibit graft and patronage jobs; but all appointments (County and City Manager, Department Heads, etc.) still have some political element to them.

A successful political machine could influence who gets hired into senior county staff positions by controlling political endorsements and the like. They could also have a strong influence on who gets county contracts for things like school and road construction. It doesn’t take much imagination to see how such a system could concentrate a tremendous amount of power into the hands of a few people with very little disclosure and even less accountability.

You’re probably thinking to yourself, “This isn’t Daley’s Chicago” or “This isn’t Pinochet’s Chile”. True, so let’s take what Harold Smith said in his Action Plan to its logical conclusion in both the Non-Partisan and Primary Election scenarios.

Non-Partisan Elections - Due to the emergence of the Republican Party in the South, Democratically-controlled North Carolina made many elections non-partisan in order to keep local Democrat office-holders safe from straight-ticket voters who identified more with the Republican nominees for President and US Congress. In these elections, the Republican party usually endorses whoever is a registered Republican running for the seat.

Now, consider the difference if a machine is controlling the process. In the event that five Republicans would be running for four seats, the party would identify all five. Of course, if only three of those five met special ideological “criteria” and got the endorsement - they would have a distinct advantage. In a county where 43% of the voters are registered Republicans, and where 63% of the straight-party tickets were Republican, the party’s endorsement would be critical to a win. So, if there’s a handful of people deciding the endorsement, then the candidates would simply be at the mercy of said handful.

Primary Elections - The current leadership of the Cabarrus Men’s Club belong(ed) to the Cabarrus County Taxpayers Association PAC (Political Action Committee). This PAC was heavily involved in the Primary Elections for County Commissioner and in the NC Legislature. The PAC had some successes in the late 90s; but in the last election Taxpayers Association candidates all lost.

Extending the Non-Partisan scenario to the Primary Elections is even scarier. If certain primary candidates are given even the smallest extra push ahead of their fellow party members by official party “bosses”, then that is nothing short of corruption of the primary process.

Second Question: What’s the position of the Republican Party on this sort of thing?

For Non-Partisan candidates, the North Carolina Republican Party’s Plan of Organization states the following in Article VII, Part A, Section 8: