Incumbents rule

RESULTS ARE in from the candidate filings with city and town clerks statewide, and the winners are: the incumbents. And the losers are: the voters.

Only 14 of the Senate's 40 seats, and only 58 of the 160 seats in the House, are being contested this year, raising the question of where democracy has gone.

If you think of it, to ``elect" means to choose. If there's no choice, how can there be an election? And if there's no true election, where's the democracy?

The fact is that Massachusetts has a disgraceful record of non-competitiveness in its legislative races, ranking worst, or next worst, of all the states over the last two decades. The 2004 state election saw what appeared to be a healthy spike, with 125 of the 200 seats contested, largely due to Republican Governor Mitt Romney's efforts to recruit Republican challengers. But most were ineffective. And those who followed the advice of Romney's hired consultants ran bruising attack campaigns that were rightly and soundly squashed by the voters. The GOP lost seats in both branches.

Romney could have tried again, with better technique, but he did not. So now the ledger is back near its low point, with candidates in nearly two-thirds of the districts running completely unopposed. One reason is that the General Court is full of legislators who think the current system is fine -- after all, it put them in office. So when a reform such as the public-financing Clean Elections Law comes along seeking to give challengers a better chance, legislators kill it, even though it was approved by the voters. It is an equal-opportunity travesty: Despite the dominance of the Democratic Party in the Legislature, Republican incumbents are almost as likely to escape challenge as the Democrats.

The phenomenon is not confined to the Legislature. In an extraordinary development, the high office of attorney general, being vacated by Tom Reilly, will apparently go to Middlesex District Attorney Martha Coakley uncontested by a challenger from either party. Voters will not be asked to express an opinion.

Massachusetts enjoys a reputation as a birthplace of democracy and a hotbed of politics. But for legislative incumbents, and some others, the home of the Freedom Trail has become the home of the free ride.