Learning to be Like the Two Major Parties.

• Author: Abelson, Maris
• Position: Greens/Green Party of New York State - Brief Article

Winning a ballot line in 1999 (thanks to the candidacy of Grandpa Al Lewis!) required the Greens/Green Party of New York State to file official party rules with the NY Board of Elections (BOE), and to elect a state committee for the purpose of filing candidates with the BOE. Fearful that such a committee would replace the traditional decision-making body of locals (the Assembly), the Assembly voted to file a skeletal set of rules with the BOE and to have the state committee's function be only to file candidates with the BOE. This differs dramatically from the major parties, whose state committees virtually control their parties from the top down.

Unfortunately, conforming to the State requirements rather than challenging them has caused problems for the Greens/Green Party of New York State. Once elected, many members of the State Committee (who were not elected by the Assembly but by enrolled Greens in their respective election districts) decided that the Assembly was unnecessary. The State Committee elected representatives to ASGP (always a function of the Assembly) and proceeded to make bylaw and...