Digital Bob Archive

Alaska Elections, VI: Two very controversial election laws of territorial days were the literacy law and the open Primary or, as it was first known, the blanket Primary. The first required that voters be able to read and write the English language. It was seen by Natives as designed to keep many of them from voting, and there is no doubt that it had that effect.

The open Primary, on the other hand, opened the way to many who refused to register as members of either political party. An open Primary law was particularly pushed by Editor Sidney D. Charles of the Alaska Fishing News (now the Ketchikan Daily News) and a bill was introduced in the 1945 legislative session by Rep. Curt Shattuck of Juneau. It was quickly batted down by the party stalwarts, but in 1946 there was a special session and Shattuck introduced it again. To get rid of it, the opponents turned it into a referendum for the 1946 General Election.

There were two questions on the ballot that fall: \"Do you favor statehood for Alaska?\" and \"Do you favor a blanket Primary election?\" In the final tally, 58 per cent of those who voted favored statehood, but a whopping 78 per cent wanted the open Primary. They got it for the 1948 election; the bill had sailed through the Legislature with only four dissenting votes. It remained on the books until 1960, including the \"lost\" Primary of April 1958, just before Congress passed the statehood law. Winners in that Primary, if they wished to get on the General Election ballot in November, had to run again on August 26.

In the second session of the First State Legislature, a comprehensive bill was introduced to pull together and codify all of the state's election laws. It changed the day of the Primary from April to the Tuesday after the second Monday of August, with a filing deadline of May 1. The bill was referred to the House Judiciary Committee and when it emerged it had been changed to a party Primary, although the voters were not required to register as party members. The elections bill passed with that provision.

There was a good deal of expressed unhappiness among the voters but two efforts, in subsequent legislative sessions, to bring back the open Primary had no success. Then in 1966 Walter Hickel was elected Governor and when the Sixth Legislature convened in 1967, House Bill 1, \"Giving voters the right to vote for candidates without regard to party affiliation in Primary Elections,\" was introduced at the request of the Governor. Of the 40 House members, 26 had signed the bill and it became law that year, effective for the 1968 election.

In addition to statehood and the blanket primary, Alaska voters during territorial days were asked for their opinions on prohibition (yes); establishing the 8-hour day (yes); compulsory jury service for women, with women only voting (yes); a unicameral legislature (no); abolishing fish traps (yes); ratify the Constitution (yes); and the Tennessee Plan (yes).

[Next week: Some final notes on the Alaska election process.]