As Americans, we are well aware after Jan. 6, 2021, that democracy needs to be carefully tended.

Too many of us take our form of government, and the freedoms it offers, for granted. Citizens can be engaged in supporting and protecting democracy in many ways.

But the cornerstone is the ballot.

A third of voting-age Americans aren’t even registered to vote. A century ago, 80 percent of Americans voted. Now, even in presidential election years, just 60 percent vote — 40 percent in other election years.

While apathy is shameful, insurrection is criminal. What led up to the Jan. 6 attack on our nation’s capitol were months of lies that the election had been stolen. Court challenges attempting to show voter fraud failed because the election was fair and the victor clear.

The peaceful transfer of power, central to democracy, was threatened because many people believed the lies — and still do.

As a small-town newspaper, we may not be able to puncture lies or reveal truths as the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol has been methodically doing in hearings this summer, but we can shed light on local politics, which no one else is covering.

Democracy matters at every level.

On July 12, Guilderland Councilwoman Laurel Bohl announced her resignation, surprising the other board members.

Bohl had been elected in 2019 on a groundswell of grassroots support from residents concerned about rampant development in Guilderland.

Bohl said she spoke for “average residents,” stating, “My only goals were to get your voices heard, get your questions answered, and to help safeguard the character and natural beauty of the town, and the quality of life of every resident.”

Certainly, those are all noble goals.

And Bohl, a lawyer and a Democrat, often stood alone on important issues, apart from the other members of the all-Democratic board. She voted against allowing the Champlain Hudson Power Express to run underground lines through town to bring power from Canada to the New York City area, citing environmental concerns.

Bohl cast the sole dissenting vote on the town board’s motion to appeal the decision that halted Pyramid’s progress with some large building projects. Bohl alone called for new leadership on the town’s planning board and said the planning board almost always votes unanimously, indicating it’s “not functioning quite properly.” 

She spoke out against prescribed times for residents’ comments at public hearings, and Bohl alone vehemently advocated for apartment dwellers as well as property owners being notified by the town about public hearings on projects in their neighborhoods.

Varied views enrich a board, often causing discussion and explanation that enlightens the public.

In the end, though, we were disappointed that Bohl would resign mid-term — and with no explanation. Being elected to a public office is a public trust. If there is a compelling reason for resignation, it should be shared with the public.

One cannot be a voice of the people if the post to represent them is abandoned.

The timing of Bohl’s resignation left the political parties in town scrambling. Bohl left just 16 days before the July 28 deadline set by State Election Law for nominees to be filed for the November ballot.

We repeat: Voting is the cornerstone of democracy. And central to voting is giving constituents a choice.

In the wake of Bohl’s resignation, we quickly tried to provide a roadmap for what would happen next. Kathleen Donovan, the Democratic commissioner for the Albany County Board of Elections, told us that, according to their party rules, Democrats in the town of Guilderland file petitions and the time to petition is already over; that deadline passed in April.

Leaders from both major parties in town told us they planned to submit nominees for the November ballot.

The dominant party in town, the Democrats, rose to the occasion, as committee members met on July 25 in a session open to the public. Two candidates were nominated and Jacob Crawford — who serves as both Guilderland’s and Albany County’s Democratic chair — won with a resounding voice vote.

Scattered among the crowd were printed red, white, and blue election signs for Crawford. Asked if the vote was preordained, Crawford told The Enterprise afterwards, “I had five or six days to plan so it was ordained as much as I could in that short time.”

The Republicans did not fare as well. Committee members met in a Delmar home the night before the July 28 deadline and chose a candidate, William Toffenetti, who, after a sleepless night, declined to run.

The GOP chairman said there was no time to convene another meeting, and so the Republicans will put up no candidate.

Where does this leave voters? Without a choice.

We remember decades in Guilderland when the GOP dominated and the party ran like a well-oiled machine. Now it’s the Democrats who dominate, as in other suburban towns around Albany.

Not quite half of Guilderland’s roughly 23,000 registered voters are enrolled as Democrats while about a quarter are enrolled as Republicans; more than a quarter are not enrolled or belong to small parties.

Now would be a good time for the Guilderland GOP to regroup so that, in the next election, which is what the party chair says will be the focus, voters have a choice.

As we said at the start, we need to tend to our democracy at every level of government.

Dictatorships like the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and authoritarian regimes like those in China, Russia, and Hungary, all call themselves democracies.

But ours, in the United States, is the original modern democracy, which used to serve as a beacon to the world. We must work at every level to keep it strong.

When Abraham Lincoln spoke in 1863 to consecrate the battlefield at Gettysburg, he spoke words that have rung through the ages about our democracy. He said it was left to the living — and we take that to mean future generations like ours — to finish the work of the dead soldiers.

“It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”