Member Statements on Resolution 26-38: Updating Chapter Standing Rules for One Member, One Vote Initial Implementation.
Submit member statements here.
IN FAVOR by Steven I
As a member of the committee that helped put this set of rules together, the work done to research chapters who use 1m1v and combine their rules into one that works for our chapter was thorough. What we have after all of this work is not only a set of rules which will bring more people into the democratic process, but also a set of rules which will make our resolution process more democratic from the start. By limiting 1m1v to just endorsements and chapter leadership, with the option to send resolutions to a vote, we put the most consequential chapter decisions into the hands of all of our members. This approach prevents us from getting ahead of ourselves and making chapter democracy more difficult from day one so that once we feel comfortable with the process and receive more input from members about the best way to bring this to further voting measures, we can be sure that the chapter has consensus and that the process expands democracy effectively.
IN FAVOR by Nate K
DSA Chapters that use some form of One Member, One Vote asynchronous online voting for officer elections, endorsements or major resolutions: New York City, Los Angeles, Metro DC, Detroit, Twin Cities, Austin, San Francisco, Boston, New Orleans, Maine, San Diego, North Carolina Triangle, St Louis, Sacramento, Inland Empire, North Colorado, Connecticut, Miami, Palm Beach County, River Valley, Central New Jersey, North New Jersey, Buffalo, Ithaca, Syracuse, Albany, Northwest Indiana, Lawrence Kansas, and more.
Our Atlanta chapter is unusual in how we hold votes and elections entirely in-person. Atlanta has major sprawl and long travel distances, which is a barrier for members to participate in our democratic decision-making. To grow our movement and engage our whole membership, we should empower all members to have more of a direct say in our chapter’s direction. Making voting easier would create a stronger sense of buy-in and legitimacy for important chapter decisions.
This rules package would move us to online all-member votes for chapter elections and candidate endorsements. Some resolutions would go to an all-member vote, upon petition of 5% of members (~80 right now), or upon a simple majority vote of a General Meeting (similar to a motion to table or a motion to refer to committee).
As our meetings have rapidly grown from 30 to 300+ in a very short time, we should reform our structures to facilitate more deliberation, town halls, and open multi-tendency discussion between members of different perspectives, as opposed to meeting contexts where people come in having largely already made up their minds for immediate snap votes. This rules package updates our resolution process to promote more open deliberation, compromise, and consensus-building by giving members more time to consider proposals, encouraging iterative feedback and friendly amendments, and moving towards a more democratic culture which elevates politics over procedure. Please vote Yes!
AGAINST by Logan M
This resolution obviously violates our bylaws. The 1M1V committee should release a report and give chapter members the proper notice to make an informed decision on this fundamental change in the character of our organization. Arguments surrounding state law are, frankly, silly and unprincipled. Asynchronous voting is the one fundamental sin of Robert’s Rules, for good reason. Decision making, separate in time and space from deliberation, is not democratic. This will transform our chapter democracy into a glorified Reddit forum where each member is only allowed only 2000 characters to speak their mind, separate from open meetings, where members have the power to control the organization and assert their authority as the highest body of leadership. General Meetings, where members can come into contact with the real, in person work of the organization in committees, will become a vestigial organ. This will further disempower “paper members” by ensuring that they remain paper members forever, in an organization that gradually becomes smaller, weaker, and easier to control.
Instead, any sectarian faction installed by undemocratic Approval-STV elections (See secondary amendment to 26-37) will pose binary questions to membership. Their legacy access to member data can be used to flood low participation polls for high margin results. YOU the member, will lose any real say over this organization, as you lack access to member data or the rooms where decisions are actually made. This will be the death of a promising proletarian mass organization, as it was for Podemos in Spain or the Your Party in the UK, and the DSA will become Democratic Party 2.
If you support “One Member One Vote”, you should want it in our bylaws. Hopefully the meeting chair will act in good faith and rule this out of order on Saturday. Vote to overrule the chair and sustain the point of order challenge and against this resolution. If it comes to it, vote NO on this resolution.
AGAINST by Sasha B
Procedurally, this resolution is out of order. Our bylaws require that general meetings follow Robert’s Rules, which prohibit asynchronous voting unless explicitly authorized by the bylaws. Because this fundamentally changes how the chapter conducts business, it should be proposed as a bylaws amendment with adequate time for member deliberation.
Politically, this resolution misses the mark on what it means to be democratic. Growing up in a liberal “democracy”, it’s understandable that many people reflexively think that more voting = more democracy. But democracy is not simply passively voting on the pre-set questions that other people have posed. One of the most powerful aspects of ATLDSA is that we uphold the long-held tradition of the mass meeting. Labor unions, the civil rights movement, and other grassroots movements have held synchronous meetings in which important decisions, like choosing to go on strike or planning the March on Washington, have been debated. Yes, sometimes these meetings can get heated because the membership cares and the stakes are high. But something transformational happens when comrades have to look each other in the eye and wrestle with, and perhaps change, what they believe in. What comes out of these contentious debates is a membership that is more engaged because they feel a stake in the decision, regardless of whether it went their way.
This resolution assumes that asynchronous voting will create a more engaged and empowered membership. It will do the opposite. It impoverishes the experience of members who can’t physically be in the room where democracy happens, while making our movement weaker by postponing the outcome to a venue outside the meeting itself. It’s a failure of imagination compared to the many ways we could actually bring democracy closer to our members: staggering meeting times, offering childcare, or building a warmer, more welcoming chapter culture.
IN FAVOR by Will B
As one of the co-chairs of the 1M1V exploratory committee, I spent a lot of time helping develop these rules. After the chapter voted at convention to explore 1M1V, we researched how other chapters handle it, gathered member feedback, and ran a successful trial. We found nothing in our bylaws that explicitly prevents electronic member voting. I would eventually like to establish a clear, permanent process in the bylaws, but standing rules let us put it into practice, learn from it, and improve it first.
These rules keep meetings as places for members to speak, debate, and make decisions. Most resolutions will continue through the normal meeting process. A chapter-wide vote would only occur if five percent of members petition for one or the General Meeting votes to refer it. Information sessions, written statements, recordings, and advance notice give members more opportunities to understand and shape a proposal before voting.
Being in the same room does not automatically mean members have enough time or information to make the best decision. At our last convention, officer candidates repeated brief statements many had already made during virtual Q&As, and I’m not sure that helped most members understand their choices. A longer process with information provided ahead of time and several ways to participate can produce more meaningful deliberation, not less.
Many members miss meetings because of work, family responsibilities, transportation, limited time or energy, or because they don’t feel connected enough to participate confidently. Giving them a meaningful role in major decisions can be an entry point into forums, meetings, and chapter work. 1M1V expands the authority of our membership and helps us build the mass democratic organization we want to become. Please vote Yes on Resolution 26-38.
AGAINST by Hunter R
On the heels of major electoral wins and the creation of the most militant American labor struggles in nearly a century coming out of the Democratic Socialists of America, what has allowed the DSA to become the largest socialist organization in American history is brought into stark conflict with the reality of the misnomer ‘1 Member 1 Vote’. Asynchronous voting (as its better called) not only conflicts with the existing bylaws and processes in which we as a democratic organization operate (i.e. Robert’s Rules), it squanders the very tangible space and democratic practices in which members old-n-new come in direct contact with these successful organizing campaigns.
Asynchronous voting produces the same contradictions many held before joining DSA: from the insufficiency of engaging in ‘discourse’ online to the proverbial ‘we know best’ approach of the Democratic party, pulling the reins from its one-time supporters’ hands. 1M1V erodes the strong tradition of in-person debate, motivational speech and political formation in lieu of a Reddit forum (i.e. where you read now). Comrades must struggle with one another in order to be able to motivate for the direction they believe the org to move and articulate meaningfully the political position in which they hold. The political oration of comrades is only a minor element of what is to be dulled if the attempts to organize our class in any avenue- be it by the ballot box, on shop floors or through community orgs- is gutted entirely by forcing members to plug-and-play through hopping on their laptop, casting a vote, and disengaging. This is antithetical to the aspirations of the chapter we have conjured up today.
In the tradition of historical socialist orgs, present-day parties and trade unions, Atlanta DSA must maintain the essential democratic practice of the general membership vote-- both to craft a vision for the working-class of what is possible and continue its exponential growth with its intersection.
IN FAVOR by Bobby G
Hello, I am an ICU nurse, and while I can sometimes control my work schedule. Sometimes I cannot. I previously could not attend the prior GM due to work for example and I had to find a proxy for such a contentious vote.
The purpose of 1m1v is to provide broader access to our rapidly expanding membership, many of whom are shift workers who can’t fully control their scheduling.
If we are supposed to be a democratic worker first party I do not understand the hesitation to make it easier for the workers in this org to vote.
I am currently not just HGO but also work on 2 committees and am also a branch coordinator.
It seems extremely unfair to discount my vote if I can’t find a proxy in time considering all the work I contribute to this organization.Finally, the reality is we have to make changes as a growing org, part of organizing is reorganizing how we do things based on our capacity and members to ensure a fair more accessible democratic representation for our chapter.
AGAINST by Benjamin B
This resolution should be voted down for two reasons: the first being that it violates our bylaws and should have been ruled out of order. Our bylaws state that Robert’s Rules govern the chapter where they do not conflict with existing bylaws, and asynchronous voting is against RR. The idea that a standing rule resolution is enough to implement “One Member One Vote” (1M1V) is simply false, and would be a violation of bylaws, the agreement between comrades that binds our chapter community. It is false that “One Member One Vote” is required to comply with Georgia state nonprofit law; GA Code § 14-3-707 (2024) states asynchronous voting is default behavior in the absence of bylaws restricting or prohibiting it, and our bylaws clearly do by stating that “Robert’s Rules govern the chapter when bylaws do not override them”.
Secondly, I aimed to address accessibility issues at chapter convention with a resolution to create a committee focused on exploring hybrid meeting options; sadly, it was fundamentally changed by amendment by proponents of governance by email poll. Additionally, many people across tendencies and caucuses in this chapter, noticing the toxic chapter culture, have agreed that people spending less time online and more time talking about issues in a human-to-human conversation would turn down the political temperature in this chapter. Do we want to spend even more time making critical and often contentious decisions about the future of our organization behind keyboards and screens?
I want to leave you with the following articles that have been written by comrades who have dealt with the fallout of “1M1V”; DSA National Convention 2025 overwhelmingly rejected email ballot voting, and you should vote NO if you don’t want the substance of political discourse in this chapter to be reduced to typing and clicking.
Democracy Dies in Inbox: Detroit DSA’s Experience of 1M1V - The Call
Atomized Democracy: The Case Against “One Member One Vote” – Libertarian Socialist Caucus
AGAINST by Owen H
This resolution violates Roberts Rules in that under RR decisions are required to be carried out synchronously at in person meetings. Therefore, this “1m1v” implementation resolution must be treated as a bylaws change. Contrary to what those who have endorsed this resolution have stated it will make our organization less democratic. The arguments made at general meetings will essentially become meaningless, as any caucus or group with a large legacy whip list will be able to dictate the direction of the ATLDSA moving forward. It can often be very uncomfortable for people to face their opposition in person, and even more so to lose votes they thought were a foregone conclusion. But if we are to maintain an effective and democratic organization we have to have deliberation that matters. This new way of operating will discourage membership from attending meetings with important resolutions, because it will no longer matter if they show up and vote. I urge everyone to vote against this resolution on Saturday.
IN FAVOR by Sean E
As the Atlanta chapter continues to grow, it’s important to have a sustainable and scalable voting process to support that growth. The proposed rule changes allow members greater opportunities to engage in and vote on chapter business. As the year progressed since Chapter Convention, members have been eager to know when One Member, One Vote would become available. The proposed rules are the result of research, feedback and testing to make electronic voting possible for all members.
Under these changes, every member can participate in chapter business through virtual sessions, in-person general meetings, and online forums. Chapter engagement through these channels allow members flexibility while maintaining their work schedule, academic commitments, and personal obligations. Regardless of whether you have a personal emergency or a challenging week at work or school, every member can vote on resolutions, amendments, and candidates on their own time. As more business occurs under One Member, One Vote, the Atlanta chapter can invest in the technical resources needed to scale with membership growth and improve the democratic process.
IN FAVOR by Matthew N
My argument in favor of One Member, One Vote (1M1V) has always been simple. We advocate for, and believe in, 1M1V within our labor unions. We believe using the popular vote instead of the electoral college for presidential elections, giving us what would essentially be 1M1V with each person’s vote weighing the same. Voting yes to implement 1M1V is the principled position.
The arguments for in-person deliberation are valid, but they do not take away the need to poll all members on matters of significant importance such as endorsements. Deliberation and robust discussion can happen in a multitude of forums, and, we can also poll all our members. They are not mutually exclusive.
We are not a vanguard party. The ability to vote should not be limited to a cadre who can make every meeting in-person. Members who work different hours, have children, or disabilities may need the option to vote online via an email poll.
I am vehemently passionate about every single dues-paying member having the right to vote on who we endorse to run for office. Questions of this magnitude should be posed to the entirety of our membership. I was a “paper member” for my first two years in Atlanta DSA from 2020 - 2022. I have since been a committee organizer, convention delegate, chapter treasurer, and even chapter co-chair. My voice on the direction of the organization mattered just the same in those first two years.
1M1V will also help with the undemocratic nature of national convention. It won’t resolve it, but it will at least make our local process more representative. Currently, the delegate system rewards hyper-engaged cadre and gives outsized influence to smaller tendencies. Having 1M1V for convention delegates would help ensure that those selected would be more representative of the will of the entire chapter, not just those who can mobilize to a meeting. Same applies for local officer positions.
Thanks to the One Member, One Vote Exploratory Committee for their work. Vote Yes.
AGAINST by Sam H
The title 1M1V is a ridiculous appropriation of the “1 Man 1 Vote” slogan from the fight for universal suffrage. Every ATLDSA member already has a vote. This is just a move to terminally online voting. For those who say this is for accessibility, they are mistaken. There are better things to try first like rotating general meeting times, days, and locations around metro Atlanta to reach more people or childcare at meetings. The abysmally low active participation rate of DSA is not because so many people are too busy and poor to attend meetings. Historically, mass member org participation was higher in the mid 20th century when people worked more hours, had more children, a lower standard of living, and had fewer labor-saving home appliances and technology. Our paper members may generally support DSA, but the current ongoing activities do not feel relevant to their personal lives and don’t convincingly offer the transformative project they want. This lack of personal motivation cannot be fixed through a big technical change in procedure. What kind of a movement asks its members to just minimally answer an email poll? How many will actually read all the member statements and watch the town halls? How many of us struggle to even watch a movie we enjoy without scrolling? Good union leaders do not ask workers to stay home and get into twitter reply battles or react to the latest epic debate win. They ask them to show up to the meeting, talk it out, and practice immediate collective agency in a room full of comrades with real follow up tasks. We must increase participation by improving accessibility and enthusiasm without enabling internet addiction and social passivity. Why do we want to recreate bourgeois democracy? Sure, simple voter participation will increase but in a shallow, impersonal way run through an inflexible, bureaucratic system. To top it all off, this proposal fudges the rules and should not be a simple resolution but a bylaws amendment.