--- title: Americans Realized Elections Matter. That's A Big Deal description: Americans saw the elections mattered and voted. Losing candidates, for the most part, conceded. All that matters more than you may realize. canonical: https://time.com/6233212/elections-matter-midterms-2022-column/ author: Philip Elliott article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2022-11-11T20:58:17.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:51:30.912Z article:section: Politics og:title: In Praise of Not Burning Down a Democracy og:description: Americans voting peacefully and candidates conceding may seem like a low bar, but clearing it mattered more than ever. og:url: https://time.com/6233212/elections-matter-midterms-2022-column/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc9351d6c728ae06b/698a37e801168244a6982833/GettyImages-1244610340.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: US-VOTE-ELECTION og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: In Praise of Not Burning Down a Democracy twitter:description: Americans voting peacefully and candidates conceding may seem like a low bar, but clearing it mattered more than ever. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc9351d6c728ae06b/698a37e801168244a6982833/GettyImages-1244610340.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # In Praise of Not Burning Down a Democracy ## Video: John Fetterman Beats Dr. Mehmet Oz, Flips Pennsylvania Senate Seat [Watch (HLS stream): John Fetterman Beats Dr. Mehmet Oz, Flips Pennsylvania Senate Seat](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/XkyhYemO.m3u8) (0:52)  _Published 2022-11-09. Democrat John Fetterman beat Trump-backed Republican celebrity television doctor Mehmet Oz in the Pennsylvania Senate race, flipping control of the seat currently held by Republican Pat Toomey, who is retiring. It’s a key pickup for Democrats, who are inching closer to retaining the Senate in what many originally expected to be a bruising midterm election for the party._  by [Philip Elliott](https://time.com/author/philip-elliott/)  ## Philip Elliott Senior Correspondent Nov 11, 2022 8:58 PM UTC  A woman waves an American flag to greet motorists as they head to vote in the midterm election at the Cesar Chavez Cultural Center in San Luis, Arizona on November 8, 2022. A woman waves an American flag to greet motorists as they head to vote in the midterm election at the Cesar Chavez Cultural Center in San Luis, Arizona on November 8, 2022.Sandy Huffaker—AFP via Getty Images  by [Philip Elliott](https://time.com/author/philip-elliott/)  ## Philip Elliott Senior Correspondent Nov 11, 2022 8:58 PM UTC _This article is part of The D.C. Brief, TIME’s politics newsletter. Sign up_ [_here_](https://cloud.newsletters.time.com/signup?nln=dc-brief&source=dc%5Fonsite) _to get stories like this sent to your inbox._ I don’t get to say this often, so I’d be remiss at the end of election week to miss the opportunity: Good job, America! You didn’t screw this up**.** Ahead of Tuesday’s Election Day, plenty of activists, strategists, and pro-democracy observers were openly [gnashing](https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2022-election/spiral-violence-fear-creating-angst-many-voters-ahead-midterm-election-rcna55740) their teeth about what would transpire. Almost three-quarters of voters told [pollsters](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/18/us/politics/midterm-election-voters-democracy-poll.html) that democracy itself was at risk, even if fewer than 1-in-10 considered the threat urgent. Rules [tightening](https://www.reuters.com/world/us/proceed-with-caution-how-new-us-laws-could-trip-up-voters-this-november-2022-09-06/) access to ballots were seen by some as intended to disenfranchise sweeping pieces of the electorate. Threats of [violence](https://time.com/6227754/political-violence-us-states-midterms-2022/) against poll workers and election officials were so common that rafts of them [quit](https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/01/politics/election-workers-officials-harassment-kentucky-texas/index.html). Candidates embraced former President Donald Trump’s [Big Lie](https://time.com/6112488/trump-2020-election-republicans/) about 2020 and [readied](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/features/2022-10-30/midterms-2022-pennsylvania-officials-try-to-beat-back-the-big-lie) their own variations for 2022\. It was no longer a _gotcha’_ question to ask candidates if they would [accept](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/16/us/politics/kari-lake-election-results-az.html) their loss; many had [prepared](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/18/republicans-refuse-accept-results/) to declare victory no matter what. Well, Tuesday came. For the most part, things seemed to go fine. When hiccups [arrived](https://time.com/6230714/arizona-voting-machines-conspiracy-theories/)—as they do every election—hyper-vigilance kicked in and remedied problems that may have been waved off in another year. [Lines](https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/08/politics/voting-election-day-lawsuits-2022) were manageable, waits in keeping with past cycles. Hyperbolic fears of assassinations proved overblown. Election denialists running for positions that could be pivtoal in the next election [lost](https://time.com/6231852/election-deniers-2022-midterms-results/) (though a couple remain too close to call). Even the most bombastic of characters running on the fumes of the Big Lie conceded, something unthinkable even Tuesday morning. It turns out, this democratic experiment might actually prove more durable than expected. Before polls had even closed, some 45 million Americans had cast ballots early—a midterm record surpassing the [39 million](https://www.electproject.org/early%5F2018) who voted early in 2018\. An [estimated](https://www.electproject.org/2022g) 112 million Americans cast ballots in total this year, and that number may still climb as counting continues. In other words, Americans saw the elections [mattered](https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/11/01/turnout-in-u-s-has-soared-in-recent-elections-but-by-some-measures-still-trails-that-of-many-other-countries/) and lent their voices to the process. That buy-in breeds legitimacy, even if your side loses. And while the United States still has some of the [lowest](https://www.cfr.org/in-brief/how-does-us-voter-turnout-compare-rest-worlds) voter participation rates in the democratic world—only one-third of the eligible voters in Mississippi, Tennessee, and West Virginia cast ballots this year, for instance—the figures are improving. States like Arizona, Pennsylvania, and Michigan [outpaced](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/interactive/2022/voter-turnout-2022-by-state/) their turnout from 2018 this year thanks to competitive races that could not be avoided. --- ### More from TIME --- **Read more**: [Election Officials Feel “Huge Relief” After Smooth Vote](https://time.com/6231746/voting-smooth-deniers-midterm-elections/) That’s not to say champions of American democracy can rest on their laurels. Far from it. The Maryland Republican who sought the attorney general gig in Annapolis has [refused](https://www.thedailybeast.com/michael-peroutka-gop-pick-for-maryland-attorney-general-refuses-to-concede-loss-to-anthony-brown) to concede despite a landslide loss. In Arizona, election-denialist candidates for governor and secretary of state [may pull out a win](https://time.com/6232690/arizona-vote-kari-lake-katie-hobbs/). MAGA Twitter remains a place where conspiracy theories [flourish](https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/08/politics/fact-check-election-voter-fraud-conspiracies/index.html). A string of bizarre statements continue to come from Trump’s distribution channels and his expected declaration of a [third](https://time.com/6197710/trump-2024-midterms-republicans/) presidential run next week will only feed those fevered circles. Still, the fact we are discussing the broad success of the American election and treating the irresponsible fringes as the standout exceptions says much about how this week unfolded. Rather than boarding up buildings yet again for protests, we’re hitting refresh on just a handful of race returns to see the margins of a majority. Instead of building shadow branches of government, losing candidates are posting campaign office equipment on Craigslist and talking about lessons learned ahead of potential rematches. All of this, in a weird way, should be celebrated. U.S. democracy has had a rough few years, admittedly. The contested [2000](https://time.com/5903361/contested-election-history/) election was a low point in modern history—not necessarily for its outcome but for its process that took a narrow part of the results all the way to the Supreme Court to determine if counting could even continue. Wave elections in 2006, 2010, and 2018 remade Congress in major ways that forced even the winning parties to rethink governance. The 2016 contest and its Russian [overtones](https://time.com/5573537/mueller-report-russia-election-interference/) still [haunts](https://time.com/5565991/russia-influence-2016-election/) Washington—and maybe Mar-a-Lago as well. The pandemic-tinged 2020 presidential races and its dumpster-fire [codas](https://time.com/5927664/capital-siege-trump-supporters/) didn’t exactly sell the world on American exceptionalism. But this year, the electorate’s relative calm and copacetic acceptance of the results sets the stage for what may be a shockingly drama-free coast to the end of the year. Plenty of work [remains](https://www.politico.com/news/2022/10/06/congress-lame-duck-00060569) to be done in Washington in the looming lame-duck session. But at least the players who will return in the coming weeks—either to prepare for their next term or to pack their offices to head home—understand the results and accept them. That speaks well for what a divided Washington might be able to accomplish in the final two years of Joe Biden’s term. And, for that, Americans should feel proud for not trying to burn down the system just because they could. _Make sense of what matters in Washington._ [_Sign up for the D.C. Brief newsletter_](https://cloud.newsletters.time.com/signup?nln=dc-brief&source=dc%5Fonsite)_._ Americans Realized Elections Matter. 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