Paul Hyde
When a motorist crashed into the back of my car a few years ago, I didn’t call the White House.
In fact, I didn’t call anyone. I was completely shocked, and not in the nice way Elvis intended.
A kind soul called 911. In short, first responders showed up. They took good care of me, I regained my balance, and everything is fine. Even if the car is complete.
But the incident was a stark reminder – if you needed a reminder – of the importance of saving lives by having reliable and competent local government: in this case, police and paramedics.
Here’s a truth that often gets lost in the heat of the political season: Local and state governments — and the people who run those governments — often influence our daily lives in a far more profound way than the federal government.
However, it is the melodrama of national politics – especially presidential politics – that dominates our public life.
Our national pastime was baseball. Now, it’s presidential politics.
It has become our main distraction, our obsession, and even our drug of choice. No wonder some of us are called news junkies.
We are relentlessly exposed to campaign ads, news coverage, and bombastic arguments on TV, news sites, Facebook, X, Substack, radio, TikTok, Instagram, blogs, and hundreds of audio files. There are desperate emails and texts from the candidates themselves asking for donations.
Call it an invasion of attention snatchers. It’s often a scene of high drama and low comedy, but we love it.
And because most news coverage focuses on one election — the presidential election — local and state politicians struggle to be heard apart from the fray.
And this is the problem. The presidential election sucks all the air out of the room.
Here is the obvious irony: Our vote is the most powerful in helping decide local and state elections.
Meanwhile, our country’s Electoral College (don’t get me started!) gives the lion’s share of the power to presidential elections in just seven swing states. All votes matter here in South Carolina, but they matter even more in local and state elections.
Who are these people?
If we were in any doubt about the vital importance of state and local elected officials, we should look no further than the disaster of Hurricane Helen, which devastated South Carolina, especially upstate.
State and local government workers arrived first on the scene — rescuing people, caring for the wounded, providing water and food, clearing trees on blocked roads and setting up shelters.
Local first responders ran toward danger to save lives and get our communities back to work. The feds showed up later, but the state and local residents came first and stayed long after FEMA left.
Many other issues have moved to the states, including abortion policy, the most controversial issue in our country. Crime is also mostly a state and local issue. Healthcare, prisons and infrastructure are core issues for the state.
State and local governments largely oversee education as well. They are the guardians of the American dream.
There is no doubt that elections are an essential democratic institution, and are administered by officials at the state and local levels.
The irony here is that many of us know much less about the state and local government candidates in our neighborhoods than we do about the presidential candidates.
I can imagine many of us in South Carolina (and I’m speaking for myself) opening the polls and, after voting for president, staring in bewilderment at all the races that didn’t get voted on.
Who are these other people? They are candidates for Congress, State Senate, State House, County Council, City Council, Mayor, Attorney, County Coroner, Court Clerk, County Auditor, and County Treasurer, to name a few. Don’t forget the Soil and Water Committee candidates.
There may be six school board candidates as well. and local ballot questions.
There’s a question about the state’s ballot this year, too.
It’s amazing. We often end up voting along party lines and for whoever seems to align with our presidential choice. It used to be said that all politics is local. Now, all politics seems to be national.
I personally don’t think this is the best way to cast an independent and informed vote. Many races are nonpartisan, especially school boards and other local races.
What to do?
So, what should an informed voter do? Despite the decline of local media, many local news organizations still do a great job of providing local coverage and creating voter guides.
The South Carolina Daily Gazette, which was about to celebrate its first birthday, has been a godsend on our state’s media landscape, and reporter Abraham Kenmore recently released a helpful guide for voters.
The League of Women Voters of South Carolina, among other nonpartisan groups, offers insight as well. Of course, information about candidates can often be found on their websites and Facebook pages. We voters should always try to catch up on local candidate debates and forums. We can view our sample ballots on the SC Votes website.
There’s also the old-fashioned idea of calling or writing candidates.
Truly informed voting, across the board, is not easy, but we’re only fooling ourselves with anything less.
Paul Hyde
Paul Hyde is a longtime Upstate journalist and educator. He worked for 18 years at the Greenville News as a columnist, editorial writer, education reporter and arts writer. He holds undergraduate and graduate degrees from Clemson and Harvard Universities. He has written for the Houston Chronicle, The Dallas Morning News, and USA Today, among other publications. He is currently a regular contributor to The Greenville Journal, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and Classical Voice North America.
