Our voting system is 200 years old and dividing the nation. What if there was a better way?

With STAR Voting voters score their candidates from 0 up to 5 stars. The two highest scoring candidates are finalists. Your vote goes to the finalist who you scored higher, and the winner is the finalist preferred by the majority of voters.

For more than two centuries, the U.S. has pioneered incredible technologies and advancements, and the country has evolved from an agrarian society to the always-online, connected country we are today. And yet with all this innovation, one thing has never changed: how we vote.

In the next 50 years, the pace of innovation will dramatically increase and we will undergo massive societal changes. How we live, how we eat, how we drive, how we work are all going to change. With the emergence of previously unimaginable technologies straight from the pages of science fiction, from autonomous vehicles to human genome editing, we desperately need a democracy that can keep up.

We already see everyday how the current voting system, and the two-party system from which it stems, contributes to legislative stagnation. It’s really really difficult to get meaningful reform passed, and this is becoming increasingly frustrating for both the electorate and for the lawmakers who swore an oath to advocate for their constituents.

Right now, we’re told to pick a side, quite literally splitting the vote. Yes or No. Red or Blue. Left or Right. But that’s not how we are, as a people or as a society. We have overlapping beliefs. We very often like two candidates equally and want to show our support for both.

STAR Voting was created in Oregon by a team of election experts who were looking for a better way. Not a system that favored either progressive or conservative values, one side versus another, but one that could actually bring all people, with their many faceted views and beliefs, together. A voting system that could show, statistically, where we agree, where we disagree, and exactly how close we are. In a fast-moving, modern democracy, this kind of information is invaluable, and it’s only possible through STAR Voting.

These election experts, from both sides of the aisle, have determined STAR Voting is the safest, simplest, and easiest way to improve the electoral process. Not just for blue states, red states, big cities or rural areas, but where it matters most: on every ballot we cast.

‘Written by Jonathan Miller

Equal Vote Coalition

A STAR Voting sample ballot