Who will take the Morse Pledge?
The Morse Pledge may sound like a big ask but it’s the sort of pledge that can start the healing and recovery Oregonians need and deserve.
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An open letter to aspiring governors
Before the dust of the election settles, many Oregonians will be in the final stages of announcing their run for governor. That’s right, the race for Mahonia Hall has already been going on for months, if not years. The second the 2022 election is officially on the horizon, don’t expect candidates to miss a beat.
So here’s an open letter to those running to lead our state:
Dear Candidate,
Our state needs healing. And, it needs to recover — economically, culturally, physically. The healing won’t come from a partisan campaign. The recovery won’t start with a partisan agenda.
You can help with this process by running a different campaign and by focusing on the most important issues. To be more precise, Oregonians need you to take some specific steps.
First, run a campaign that places principles above politics. I know I sound idealistic, but Oregon could use a good dose of lofty political thinking and you’re in a prime position to deliver it.
The campaign that Oregonians need should follow three rules:
No out-of-state money. If you care so much about the state’s future, then build your support from its residents.
Set a cap of $5,760 for any single donation as well as for total contributions from a single donor. Why that number? It’s the median monthly income for Oregonians. There’s few Oregonians that have a month’s salary to spare on this race. Those without the means to contribute should not have the race dictated by those for whom a political donation is an investment.
Skip the debates, attend regional policy forums. Long gone are the days when debates were meaningful exchanges among candidates, as pointed out by Jim Moore, a longtime observer of Oregon politics and contributor to The Oregon Way. So let’s skip the hours-long swap of canned responses and instead emulate what the Oregon Wheat Grower League (OWLG) used to do. In an earlier age, the OWLG would invite candidates and a team of staffers to respond to a policy exercise. Why is this approach superior? According to Moore:
The OWLG saw which candidates could relatively quickly put together a viable plan to deal with a policy issue. They saw who the candidates might select to play a key advisory goal.
Oregonians deserve this more civilized approach to selecting their next governor. That’s also why candidates should take the Common Cause pledge, a set of expectations that will further ensure you and your fellow candidates spend more time on the issues, rather than appealing to party officials and elite donors.
The Morse Pledge
But the campaign is just one step in the healing and recovery. That’s why I’m asking each of you to take the Morse Pledge. What’s the pledge?
First, advance structural changes to reduce the power parties wield over our government. One such change would be opening the primaries. Open primaries are a simple way to make our democracy more fair — all voters should be able to participate in every stage of the election.
Second, make your administration apartisan. You can do this by actively surrounding yourself with Oregonians across the political spectrum. It’s one thing to select Republicans and Democrats to join your team of rivals, it’s a whole other thing to acknowledge that Oregonians are tired of the idea that political ideas and officials should come exclusively in deep shades of blue and red.
Finally, be the governor of all of Oregon by pledging to spend half your days on either side of the Cascades. Oregonians in every part of the state deserve to have access to the governor.
The Morse Pledge may sound like a big ask but it’s the sort of pledge that can start the healing and recovery Oregonians need and deserve.
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Kevin Frazier does his best to edit The Oregon Way while “attending” the UC Berkeley School of Law. He is splitting his time between SF and Oregon.
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