What’s a Mandate - Answers
One week ago I posed a question that picqued my interest - What is a mandate? It was inspired by Publius, a regular reader of this blog. There weren’t many responses to this, to be perfectly honest, but I think that is because it’s a difficult question. Here’s the responses I did recieve:
Alex Charyna of PA Water Cooler wrote:
I think the definition of mandate only extends to the executive branch. It doesn’t make sense in terms of legislature, only because a 90-10 win is as strong as a 50.1 to 49.9 win.
Did Bush have a mandate in 2004? I think so… he had more voters than anyone in American history. Does he still have a mandate? Definately not.
Above Average Jane took a stab at the question also:
A flippant answer would be a mandate is when everyone in my house agrees on what we should have for dinner. A more political explanation is probably what Matt had in mind.
The Webster’s dictionary we have at home lists a number of definitions for mandate. The most applicable one is “an authorization to act given to a representative.” We tend to think of it as something indicated by a lopsided electoral vote. There is no understanding on what that percentage is. Pres. Bush claimed he had a mandate with a bare majority (if that). I would tend to think you would have to have somewhere close to 70% to say you have a mandate. You could probably get a 70% agreement on the need for immigration reform, health care reform, and the need to end the war in Iraq. Where things get sticky is now the what but the HOW. How should we change health care? How should be get out of Iraq? How should we change our immigration laws? The devil is in the details.
I appreciate the responses, but as you can see, it’s a difficult question to answer.
I promised I would take a stab at it as well - so here goes. I could answer that a mandate is an overwhelming majority that agrees with a candidate about a policy issue, as measured through the vote totals. What does overwhelming majority mean - great question. I could say when a candidate fares better than he/she was projected to do by 5%. Of course, 5% is a number I pulled out of thin out, why not make it 4% or 10%? Herein lies the problem - there is no standard for what a mandate it.
Which leads us to what I feel is a better answer to the question of what is a mandate? A mandate is difficult to define, but there are certain characteristics that all candidates who have mandates have - they won elections, sometimes by what many consider landslide proportions, sometimes because they did better than they were supposed to. Mandates typically apply to candidates with a specific message - maybe its on one policy that was the highlight of the campaign, or maybe the broader theme of the campaign. Mandates have requirements from what I can tell - action to carry out the mandate is expected in a reasonable quick timeframe. Once the window of opportunity closes, the voters feel betrayed. How long is that window of opportunity, another great question with a answer for every person out there.
The real answer to the question of what is a mandate is this - just like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said in a 1964 ruling on pornography: “I know it when I see it.” I think that’s the best answer to the question. In fact, I’d go one step further - What’s a manadate? I know it when a bunch of other people see it with me. Mandates are just one of those things that aren’t measurable, but more of a gut feeling.