Many Americans believe that probabilities of success of political candidates should weigh against their moral value. They vote for a popular candidate they admit is more evil than an unpopular candidate because they are concerned about how likely it will be that the unpopular one succeeds. It’s the truism of third party critics: “Don’t waste your vote.” I am close to someone who insisted vehemently that the Virginia ballot (which had at least five candidates listed, not to mention registered write-in candidates) had “only two candidates.” He meant that only two had a competitive probability of winning, and that such a probability should limit our choice.
The problem with this is that it views the outcome of the election as the purpose of our vote. Probabilities have the outcome in view. Rather, we must view our vote as the purpose of our vote.
According to the Doctrine of Double Effect, it is not permissible to more directly cause a lesser evil in order to less directly avoid a greater evil. The reason is that the bad that I cause by my action is more causally immediate than the good, and is therefore involved by definition as a means to the other outcome which I effect less directly (when I foresee both). I therefore “do evil that good may result,” which is always wrong. Contrary to popular idiom, the ends do not justify the means! Foreseeing both good and bad effects of an action, we may only do it if the good proceeds from our action at least as immediately as the bad. In terms of voting, this means we may only vote for a candidate if the good and bad effects of our vote are equally direct.
In the case of voting for an evil candidate in order to achieve as a good outcome the avoidance of another candidate’s success, the evil effect is our vote, and the good effect is an outcome of the election. So, when we vote, do we cause the outcome of an election as directly as we cause our vote? Not at all! We do not each cause the outcome of the election. Rather, we each directly, certainly, and completely cause our vote, and all of our votes contribute to the outcome as minuscule partial causes, fragments of probability that together equal the whole. Therefore, a vote that one admits is evil but intends for the avoidance of a worse electoral outcome causes the lesser evil (itself) directly, and avoids the greater evil (the outcome) only partially and indirectly. Such a vote is never permissible according to the Doctrine of Double Effect.
Instead of using my vote as an evil means to a good end, I must vote with my vote itself as its own moral end, because it is only my vote that I fully cause. I must make it the most moral vote in and of itself. In other words, I must not compromise my moral beliefs based on the predicted outcomes of the election or the popularity of candidates; rather I must vote as I would if I alone controlled the outcome of the election. That is what is binding on me as a moral agent with a voice in my democracy.
For what does it profit a man if he gains the oval office and forfeits his soul?
Ben Taylor 