By Tim Howes
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The Conforti v. Hanlon case has made news on the political blogs this week. The Conforti plaintiffs have asked the federal court to end the “county line” in New Jersey primaries. That means that they want to suppress the free speech and associational rights of myself, the hundreds of grass roots activists in the party that I lead, and the party itself. While it doesn’t appear that my opinion is welcomed by the Conforti plaintiffs, I am going to air it here.
2020 congressional candidate Arati Kreibich is not the lead plaintiff, but she is a good study why this suit is bad for taxpayers and voters. Ms. Kreibich’s argument appears to rest at least in part on the belief that that she lost her primary to Congressman Gottheimer because she ran “off the line”, and that if there was no line she would have won. That’s nonsense.
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Let’s start with the main fallacy in the Ms. Kreibich’s argument: That a candidate cannot win off of “the line.” History disproves this proposition. If a candidate runs a good campaign with a good, resonant message, he or she can win off of “the line”. Conversely, a candidate running “on the party line”, who runs a poor campaign with a poor message, will lose.
I am most familiar with Republican history, especially in my home county of Somerset. In 2001, Bret Schundler ran off of “the line” in Somerset County for governor. He won the primary Somerset County running off “the line”. Indeed, he was off “the line” in almost every county in New Jersey, yet he won the Republican gubernatorial primary by 15 points.
There are legions of examples of candidates winning off the line in Somerset County. Most recently, Bridgewater Mayor Matt Moench and his council allies defeated an incumbent mayor and his ticket in a primary by 20 points in 2019. They won with a good organization and a potent anti-overdevelopment message. Rich Onderko, the current mayor of Manville got his start by winning the 2009 Republican primary from Column “D” on the ballot. That same day, my wife Kathy defeated the scion of a political dynasty when she ran in Column “D” on the primary ballot. Over the years, candidates have won off “the line” in Branchburg, Bedminster, Peapack-Gladstone, and Bernardsville, and beyond.
The “party line” does matter. However, Ms. Kreibich did not lose because she ran off the line; she lost because her message was that of the extreme left. Congressman Gottheimer’s more moderate message – and his fundraising prowess – carried the day. One of Ms. Kreibich’s key policy positions is support for the “Green New Deal.” AOC’s Green New Deal sought to make many sweeping changes to the American economy, including, replacing or rebuilding every building in America, banning nuclear energy and ending all traditional forms of energy, and rendering air travel obsolete. This sweeping, economy-killing proposal did not include any payment plan for these reforms, and is far outside the mainstream of American political thought.
Since these far-left candidates can’t win with a left-wing message, what’s their answer? Ask a federal court to suppress the First Amendment rights of those who oppose them. There are three First Amendment Rights at stake here.
- Free association. The “party line” is made up of candidates of all offices from county committee to local, county, state and federal office who choose to associate with each other, and to communicate that association with the voters. Freedom of association is a protected right.
- Free speech. Candidates who share common values who are allied have the right to communicate that to the voters. Look at the Mayor Moench example again. He ran with two like-minded allies who ran for township council, and they bracketed with two county-level candidates. By running off “the line” in his own line with council candidates and county-level candidates in a primary, Mayor Moench was communicating to the public who his allies were, and who he opposed. It only makes sense to group those candidates on a ballot as a form of communication. To do anything different would to obscure those alliances and cause confusion on the ballot.
- Party governance. Not only does the First Amendment protect freedom of political speech and association, it also protects the rights of a political organization to govern itself. That right has been affirmed in a long line of Supreme Court decisions dating back to the 1990s, starting with Eu v. San Francisco Democratic Central Committee and Tashijan v. Republican Party of Connecticut. New Jersey political parties have decided to allow the party line on the primary ballot. Some organizations use the party line. Some don’t. That’s their decision, and not the business of the federal court.
The Conforti plaintiffs would be on the side of free speech if they were to attempt to make by-laws changes in the various committees. The rank-and-file would have the opportunity to vote on the proposition in free and fair elections. Instead, they are doing it the left-wing way by invoking the coercive powers of the federal court to suppress the freedoms of others. There is nothing free or fair about what they are proposing or how they are going about it, especially when the voices of thousands of grassroots activists and candidates, and hundreds of party committees, will not be heard in court.
The court should throw out this frivolous suit before too much taxpayer money is spent on legal bills.
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TIM HOWES is a New Jersey attorney and chairman of the Somerset County Republican Organization (SCRO)
