Two Things about Voting

Two things are most important among many others for all voters to remember as the historical (and heavy) General Election ballots sit in our laps waiting to be mailed or cast by Nov. 8.
First, of course, is the decision to actually stand up and vote and not sit home for the next four years bitching about the outcome.
Second is to prepare for the revelation that not every candidate or ballot question we support will win. What we do after Nov. 8 — especially in local elections — will be much more important than our tallied votes from the first Tuesday of November.
We can be poor losers or we can choose to be part of the solution. We can keep fighting a lost political battle, or we can help create a new agenda for solving real problems like housing costs, bad roads, pension debt, new county leadership, marijuana laws and national pride.
In all the possible outcomes from this election, we are yearning for one most especially. And that is an increased engagement in authentic citizenship. From Trump versus Clinton, to city council choices, we are faced with deep divisions among us. How we come together, or how we agree to talk to one another as a community and as a nation will make history. Congressional gridlock must end and we, the people, must stop all the excuses for this not to happen no matter who gets inaugurated next Jan. 20 on the steps of the U.S. Capitol.
Locally, we have allowed too much negativity and financial influence into our city, county and local district elections. Our election campaigns have become dark and rancid affairs. The answer to this trend is the openness, fresh air and new light that more active citizenship can deliver.
Our affordable housing problem will not be solved on Nov. 9, no matter how we vote. The “balance of power” at the county’s Board of Supervisors won’t be known for many months to come, after we find out which citizens and constituent groups choose to stay mobilized and which ones stay mad and crawl back to their partisan safe zones. Our future with legalized cannabis will continue to unfold over the next few years, whether Prop. 64 wins or loses.
But first, we must vote as if a single vote might make the difference. We remember a recent Healdsburg school board election decided by just 18 votes. Two elections ago, the third  seat for the Sebastopol City Council almost went to a runoff it was so close. A slim majority one way or the other in this election might add a half cent or more to the everyday sales tax we are all forced to pay.
In this year when the United States might elect its first woman president, we are reminded how women first won the right to vote under the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
After the U.S. Congress narrowly approved the 19th Amendment, it had to be approved by two-thirds of the states’ legislatures. With time running out and the states’ votes evenly split, the choice next fell to Tennessee. A no vote would mean women would remain in political slavery.
On the eve of the Tenneesee vote, the tally appeared to be deadlocked at 48-48. A tie vote would mean defeat. Then, at roll call, one man, Harry Burn, switched his vote to yes and history was made, instantly adding millions of women to the eligible voting lists of our democracy.
Burn’s vote made it possible for women to vote and join the nation’s political arena, but it took several more decades of citizen action, protests and legal reforms for women to actually vote, win elections and gain full citizenship.
Women’s suffrage was won 96 years ago, but just like so much that is in our Nov. 8 ballots, voting is just the beginning of active citizenship.
— Rollie Atkinson