Congratulations to the winners - now get back to work!
Now what? First a round of applause. Not for the winners.
For the voters.
They were the real winners in Tuesday’s historic midterm election. They proved that democracy works, that the best place to register your feelings was not on social media, but at the voting booth.
Initial reports indicate a much larger than normal turnout for a non-presidential election. Voters braved the elements and a pounding rain that fell for much of the day to exercise their constitutional right. Democracy reigns. We love it.
It wasn’t just the voters braving the elements. Democrat Mary Gay Scanlon, running for Congress in the newly constructed 5th District, stood in line for 25 minutes after arriving bright and early to cast her ballot at Swarthmore Borough Hall.
She had plenty of company. By the way, so long as we are handing out kudos, a big thumb’s up to the former president of the Wallingford-Swarthmore School Board. Scanlon made a little history yesterday, becoming the first woman from Delaware County ever elected to Congress.
It was long overdue, as it is in so many areas of Pennsylvania government. We acknowledge the victory of Democratic incumbent Gov. Tom Wolf, while we wonder how it is that a woman has never resided in the governor’s mansion other than as the state’s first lady. That’s right. Pennsylvania has never elected a woman governor.
And hosannas as well to incumbent Democrat U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, who rolled to victory yesterday as well. And yet we again notice that Pennsylvania has never elected a woman senator either.
In fact, only seven women have ever been elected to Congress from Pennsylvania. Of those, three filled seats vacated when their husbands died in office.
That changed yesterday with the election of Scanlon. She won’t be alone. Right next door, Chrissy Houlahan rolled to an easy victory in Chester County’s 6th District congressional race.
Across the country, this midterm was dominated by a name that did not appear on the ballot. It was seen by many as a litmus test for the first two years of Donald Trump’s presidency.
In the months and weeks leading up to yesterday’s historic vote, the nation seemed to fracture, split between those embracing Trump’s vision of making America great again, and those who insisted the president was doing little aside from making America grate again.
It is a nation divided.
And yesterday’s vote won’t change that.
But it is a reminder to all public officials that they are beholden to the voters.
All of the voters.
Not just those on the Left. Or the Right.
Not just conservative or liberal. Not just red or blue. There is much to be done. On the federal level, the question of health care and pre-existing conditions continues to linger. If this election proved nothing else, it is that health care remains very much in the forefront of people’s minds.
While the economy is going great guns, and the jobs numbers are solid, too many citizens are one serious illness from fiscal calamity. And those with pre-existing conditions continue to wonder if they are just one vote away from losing their health care.
Here in Pennsylvania, a slew of unfinished business awaits our slovenly Legislature when they finally return to Harrisburg.
Property taxes continue to rise, education funding continues to be unbalanced, a public pension time bomb continues to tick inside the state budget, and the state insists on solving seemingly every revenue obstacle with a new gambling adventure.
Then there is a piece of unfinished business from their most recent session. That would be the notion of a window for victims of decades-old sexual abuse to have their day in court. A bill to do just that passed the House this fall, before stalling in the Senate. It never even made it out onto the floor for a vote.
Now that process must start all over again. It should.
And while they’re at it, legislators should finally approve a ballot question that would see the job of drawing up congressional districts taken out of the hands of politicians and into a bipartisan citizen panel. Yes, there is plenty to do. Congratulations to the winners.
Now gather up those campaign signs and get back to work.
And remember you are supposed to be representing all those people who stood in the rain yesterday to voice their beliefs, and exercise their constitutional rights.
Too often winning candidates waste little time getting started on their first order of business - getting re-elected.
The guess here is that the very first words we hear this morning won’t be words at all but rather four simple numbers. 2020.
There is plenty of time for that. Right now there is a long list of issues to confront Ladies and gentlemen, let’s go to work.