At the Massachusetts State Convention, Representative Ed Markey introduced Democratic National Committee Chairperson Howard Dean saying that Dean reached out to young voters and gave them faith in party politics.

Not only has Chairman Dean reached given young voters faith in party politics, but he has made them feel welcome. In his speech before the convention, he said that the most important thing that he wanted to tell everyone at the convention is, “We need you.”

He spoke about needing people to get out and knock on doors. He said, “We need a Democratic Governor in Massachusetts in 2006. We can’t do it without you. We need you to exercise some discipline on the party. We do not want to destroy ourselves before we get to the primary.”

This is an important message that too often gets lost. We need to make new people feel welcome in the party. We need to help them get involved. Both Bill Galvin and Tom Reilly commented about how the Democratic Party in Massachusetts has been losing people. Some of it may be because the party hasn’t worked hard enough to make sure that everyone has access to good health care, a good education and good jobs, but some of it may also be because the party hasn’t worked hard enough to make new people feel welcome.

This provided an important segue between the speeches of the gubernatorial candidates and the voting to approve the revision of state party charter. I had been warned ahead of time that the charter revision was likely to be fairly contentious.

Initially there was a motion to separate the voting instead of having one up or down vote. The state chairperson warned that this would make the convention last several extra hours, which other later suggested was false. Other than his comments on the proposal there was no discussion and the motion was voted down on a voice vote.

At this point, there was a voice vote on whether to approve the platform and the charter revisions. At least from my vantage point in the press box, it sounded as if the ‘no’s prevailed. There was an awkward silence as the question, ‘Um, okay, what do we do now?’ was considered.

The chair then proposed to have a second vote, this time based on counting the number of people standing to support or oppose the revision of the charter. This time, it appeared clear that more people stood to support the revision than stood to oppose it. A point of order was called suggesting that the standing vote was improper and there should have been a roll call vote. The chair read the pertinent section of the existing rules and argued that a roll call vote was not necessary. A motion was then proposed and seconded that there should be a roll call vote. The chair again complained that this would take too long, urged people to vote against a roll call vote, and quickly held a vote without a chance for discussion. The motion to have a roll call vote was defeated in a voice vote and the business was completed to shouts of “New Leadership” from many people in the hall.

The convention then moved to adjourn and I started packing up. I spoke with quite a few different people about the events. People close to the chair argued that he would never do anything improper to get his way in a vote. They talked about the importance of getting business done quickly so that people wouldn’t need to stay all day and leave out of boredom. I questioned how this related to making new people feel welcome in the party and staunching the flow of people out of the party. They justified the action saying that people had been given adequate opportunity to express their opinions already, yet had no suggestions about how to make people feel more welcome.

Others were less charitable. Some leaders in the party refused to say anything other than that they could not comment. They seemed to view the event as a damaging fiasco and recognized that nothing is ever truly off the record. Some viewed this as being simply about the platform and commented that this was typical of Massachusetts party conventions.

Those who were opposed to the charter revisions, however, were livid. Some compared the chair to Stalin. Others compared him to Bush. Some suggested that this would be challenged in the Judicial Council or even in the courts. Others commented that the Judicial Council stacked and it wasn’t worth the challenge.

Unfortunately, I cannot find the revisions of the charter online anywhere (which in and of itself is a big issue), so I need to rely on the hearsay. As I understand things, one of ther revisions was that the procedure for getting on a primary ballot was changed to require a candidate to get 15% of the delegates at the convention and that there was not a provision for candidates to get on the ballot by petition. This sounds very similar to the procedure that deemed unacceptable by courts in Connecticut. Another revision was to increase the fee to be a delegate to $75. Again, my understanding is that such a rule would be against Connecticut law. In Connecticut you cannot charge a fee for anyone to be in any sort of elected position. Other concerns were that the executive committee was given much greater say.

In Connecticut, we elected a new State Chair this year. Some people expressed concern that while she is a very successful fundraiser, she hadn’t been known being closely tied to the grassroots. However, since her election she has done a wonderful job of reaching out to new grassroots activists.

It does not appear as if these votes sent a message to newly involved Democrats that they were needed or appreciated. It is not clear that this is an example of the party discipline that Chairman Dean called for, the party discipline that will be needed to defeat Romney.

I do hope, for the sake of all Democrats in Massachusetts, that the current leadership can find new ways to reach out to grassroots activists and grassroots activists can respond in a similar search for common ground and that we can all find new faith in true democracy in Massachusetts.