Sunday Election

Today Red Baron voted for the European Parliament and Freiburg's city council. Strasbourg is far away, but our Rathaus (city hall) is within walking distance.

Freiburg's city council has 48 members, meaning I had an equal number of votes to cast. This has historical reasons. Up to 1248, the city council only had 24 members, all of the noble families who were city councilors by birth and for a lifetime. Because they mismanaged public property, a small revolution occurred in May 1248. All citizens assembled in the Münster church square and demanded that an additional 24, mostly younger members of the nobility, merchants, and craftsmen, be added to the city council, helping the established 24 with the administration. These new members were elected every year. This timid "democratization" continued up to 1386.

The document of May 1248 enlarging Freiburg's city council

When in the Battle of Sempach in the same year, the Swiss slaughtered 656 earls, noblemen, and patricians, mostly from Freiburg, these people suddenly lost their majority in the city council. The Austrian Duke Leopold IV., Freiburg's new ruler, decided in 1392 that all 48 council members be elected yearly, composed of 12 patricians, 12 merchants, and 18 masters of the guilds plus 6 additional guild members.

Nowadays, our 48 city councilors are elected for a 5-year mandate. Thirteen parties would like to sit in Freiburg's town hall. The lists of candidates of the various parties are contained in a longish booklet where the voter has the agony of choice. Is this the reason why less than half of Freiburg's citizens cast their votes?

 

The title of the booklet. It contains 13 ballot sheets.
Only half the length is shown.
On the bottom, it reads: You, therefore, have 48 votes.

In fact, the voting system for city councils in Baden-Württemberg is rather complicated. The easiest way to vote is to tear one page for a particular party out of the booklet, place this ballot sheet in a prepared envelope, and then into the voting box. If you like to calculate, a party list for one seat in the city council must draw a minimum of 2.08% of the votes.

Red Baron likes to have it complicated. First, I never support my party's order of its 48 candidates on the ballot sheet. Here I can häufeln (cumulate) up to three votes on particular candidates, thus moving them up the list. A party getting 14% of the votes will have 7 seats in the city council. So the first 7 persons from their list are elected. You can (slightly) influence the order on the ballot sheet in cumulating your votes.

Second, I know several candidates from other parties personally and want to give them some of my votes. In this case, I panaschiere (mix) my choice in adding the names of the persons of other parties on my party list by hand. Then I attribute to them up to three votes. In these games, there is only one condition to fulfill: Your ballot sheet must not count more than 48 votes in total.

P.S: The voting results for Freiburg's city council were known only today (May 27) as the poll workers first had to count the votes for the European parliament. Whereas in Europe, the Eurosceptics increased their number of deputies by 50%, Freiburg's city council results show no surprises. Here are the seats for the various parties in the new assembly (in brackets is the distribution of seats in the previous council elected in 2009):

Green Party (Grüne)               11 (11)
Christian Democrats (CDU)    9 (10)
Social Democrats (SPD)          8  (9)
Leftist List (LiSSt)                  4  (4)
Free Voters (FW)                     3  (3)
Livable Freiburg (FL)             3  (0)
Free Democrats (FDP)            2  (4)
Culture List (KULT)               2  (2)
Young Freiburg (JF)               2  (1)
Alternative Greens (GAF)      1  (2)
Independent Women (UFF)    1  (0)
The Party (DIEPARTEI)         1  (0)
Christians for Freiburg (CFF)  1  (0)

Mayor Dieter Salomon commented: Freiburg bleibt regierbar, aber der Gemeinderat wird bunter (Freiburg remains "governable," but the city council is more colored). It will be challenging to attribute different and distinct colors to all thirteen parties presented in Freiburg's new city council, although some only with one seat.

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