Reporter Columnist
Congratulations, fellow voter, you cast a ballot. Now it’s time to sit back, relax and let our newly elected, or reelected, representatives take it from here, right? Not exactly.
Actually, I have bad news. Your work is far from over. That “I Voted” sticker we saw in your Facebook selfie is nothing more than a signing bonus.
You see, this whole representative democracy thing only works if we are constantly engaged in the process. And, my, is it a process. It’s not like mixing up a few ingredients in a pan, throwing it in the oven and coming back an hour later to find a finished product. Nope.
This process is more like cooking a pot of soup on the stove. You’ve got to lift up the lid every so often to inspect what’s going on inside. Stir it up. Make sure nothing sticks to the bottom. It’s the only way to get it to taste just right.
I know candidates talk about the finish line of Election Day like the hard work is over when it’s merely the starting gate of their governing and our paying attention.
“On election nights, we remind each other that victory is not a vindication, it is an instruction, not an endorsement, but an assignment,” former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels said in a widely-praised 2011 speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference.
Voting is the same. Casting a ballot isn’t about checking a box and waiting for the next election to come around, it’s our chance to hit refresh and start all over again – if we want.
So while in Indiana we do get a year off from voting next year, we don’t get a year off from being civically engaged.
Our voices matter just as much on Election Day as they do the other 364 days of the year. It may not always feel that way, especially if you end up on the wrong side of victory. Losing an election can leave supporters feeling voiceless and alone. But you’re not.
I’m reminded of a scene from The West Wing, the highly-regarded Aaron Sorkin-conceived drama, which ironically enough took place in Indiana. In this particular scene, characters Josh Lyman and Toby Ziegler are left behind to fend for themselves in rural Indiana after a time zone snafu causes them to miss their flight on Air Force One.
Eventually they find their way to a bar where a proud father who toured Notre Dame with his daughter earlier that day is taking a load off. The ensuing conversation inspires legislation to make tuition paid for by hardworking Americans such as that man tax deductible.
The scene was dramatized, yet it’s one I’ve seen more than once play out in real life.
Dan Coats, then a candidate for the U.S. Senate, would jump in the car after events and say to me, “Did you hear that story?” He would go on to relay what he heard and then he would share that same story with his audience at the next stop. And then the next stop.
Six years later, in his first run for governor, a man ran up to Eric Holcomb on the steps of the Carroll County Courthouse during the Delphi Bacon Fest to share his personal story of battling drug addiction.
“The look in his eyes will never leave me,” Holcomb would regularly say on the campaign trail and after taking office. “I pledged from that day that this would be a central part of me.”
The people who spoke to Coats and the man who spoke to Holcomb might never know the powerful impact their human stories had on the then-candidates. But it’s an impact each of us can have every day.
Between now and the next time we vote – in 2022! – call and write those elected to serve you. Let them know how you feel about the issues. Don’t let them ever say, “No one has contacted me about that.” At the same time, extend them grace if what you say is new to them. We all hear something for the first time.
And when you get frustrated that politicians only show up around election time, remind yourself that it goes both ways. Influence in politics, like becoming a halfway decent cook, comes from constant observation and knowing exactly the right moment to turn up the heat or get out of the kitchen.
Pete Seat is a former White House spokesman for President George W. Bush and campaign spokesman for former Director of National Intelligence and U.S. Senator Dan Coats. Currently he is a vice president with Bose Public Affairs Group in Indianapolis. He is also an Atlantic Council Millennium Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations Term Member and author of The War on Millennials.