This time, the Illinois primary mattered

Think back to the Illinois presidential primary in 2004, when voters here had no say in who would emerge as the candidates for the White House in November. Democrat John Kerry and President George Bush had already locked up their respective parties' nominations.

Same thing in 2000, with Bush and Al Gore.

But this year Illinois was not a third-stringer doing mop-up duty off the bench, as in the past. By moving up the primary, Illinois gave its voters a voice on Super Tuesday. And the state's Democratic leaders who supported an earlier date for the 2008 primary with the hope it would bolster the nomination hopes of Barack Obama saw the state's junior senator come away with a resounding victory in Illinois. But Republican voters were also energized. They came out strong for Sen. John McCain.

Yet, moving up the primary did not give voters in Illinois a more singularly influential role in deciding the outcome of the presidential race, given several other states joined Illinois in moving their primary closer to Groundhog Day than the first day of spring.

Actually, Illinois might have found itself to be a more pivotal state in big-state elections ahead had it not pushed back its primary date. Nothing was decided Tuesday. McCain has certainly gained momentum. But Obama isn't the clear front-runner. Neither is Sen. Hillary Clinton.

Which means voters are going to be treated to what will hopefully be a spirited and issues-oriented campaign, to their benefit, not one that turns mean and muddy, to their dismay.

No doubt the worrisome state of the economy is on the minds of voters. Yet it is interesting to note that economic uncertainty was not reflected in votes on several local referendums. On the very day voters had every reason to reject tax hikes -- on Tuesday the Dow Jones industrials plunged 370 points -- a number of school districts, park districts and two library districts received permission to raise tax bills.

This also defies the conventional wisdom that tax increase requests stand little chance of approval when they are on the ballot in a presidential election year, when voter turnout is high.

This speaks to well-run referendum campaigns on the part of taxing districts. They are to be congratulated. But more than anything it is testimony to the willingness of taxpayers to make sacrifices -- even in tenuous financial times -- when they need to in support of education and vital public services.

We hope the governing units truly recognize this. We hope they are saying, "look at what these voters, who are struggling out there, did for us, for their community."

And make sure that every new dollar they get is spent exactly the way taxpayers intended in casting a "yes" vote. Don't slap the hand that just helped you.

Indeed, this faith voters have put in respective governing units should be rewarded with prudent management of every tax dollar.