Low Turnout Paves Melton's Way

by Adam Lynch
June 15, 2005

On June 10, election officials tallied the official count of voters in Jackson’s June 7 mayoral elections. Last-minute tallies revealed that Democrat winner Frank Melton walked away with 26,759 votes, or 88.8 percent of the vote. Soft-spoken Republican candidate Rick Whitlow stepped off with a small 3,369 votes, or 11.2 percent of the vote.

Local papers considered Melton’s win a landslide victory although Jackson Municipal Election Commission co-chairwoman Barbara Powell called the actual number of votes a very low turnout compared to past elections.

“I really can’t tell you the average, but this was pretty low,” said Powell, who has worked with the elections office since 1989.

There were 30,128 votes cast in the June 7 general election. With there being 131,713 voters registered in Jackson, the election only stirred up about 22.8 percent of voters.

Jackson resident Libby Greaves said she didn’t bother voting in the general election, saying she didn’t see the difference between either Melton or Whitlow. “I don’t even know much about the Republican, but I know Frank, and my support didn’t go with him in the last one (election),” said Greaves, who works at a mechanics shop in West Jackson. “As far as I could tell, they both said the same things.”

Christopher Lawrence, visiting assistant professor of political science at Millsaps, said he believed a lot of voters felt the election was decided in the primaries. “I think a lot of people thought the election was already decided. I think that was the biggest explanation as to why turn-out was low,” Lawrence said. “Also, Whitlow had a fairly low-key campaign, so he didn’t create a good level of interest that might have gotten people interested.”

With 92 of 95 precincts reporting, incumbent Harvey Johnson got 14,779 votes to Melton’s 25,922 votes in the May 2 primaries. Democratic challenger Annell Vaughn Smith received 272 votes. The May 3 cataloguing of 40,973 votes meant that 33 percent voted in the primaries.

Lawrence said that the nature of horse-race media might have eroded community interest. “If people are told this guy’s going to win over and over again, then I can see how that would convince people that it may not be worth going to the polls. And when you hear nothing but how one guy is going to trump the other it’s not really substantiative information that voters can use to make decisions.

Allan McBride, associate professor of political science at the University of Southern Mississippi, echoed Lawrence’s comments, but referred to horse-race media as more of a “mixed blessing.”

“By focusing on the horse race, the media stimulates the true believers but, no, it certainly doesn’t provide information about candidates and their positions,” McBride said.

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