ACROSS AMERICA last week, voters had a choice. Many of them -- conservatives as well as liberals -- rebelled against a party that had grown complacent and corrupt, too much in love with its own power to restrain spending, demand accountability over Iraq, and curtail illegal immigration. Both houses of Congress fell to the Democrats.

That is the way democracy, for all its flaws, is supposed to work. Change -- and even the threat of change -- is healthy. If the national Republican Party hopes to revive, it must rethink its message and behavior.

Such soul-searching serves the public well. By contrast, legislators who have no fear of losing are free to pander to the special interests that empower and enrich them, and ignore the common good. They don't have to rethink anything.

Now consider Rhode Island. Complacency and corruption are serious issues here, too. One state senator pleaded guilty to selling his office for gain, and federal investigators are reportedly zeroing in on others.

The state faces massive deficits, skyrocketing property taxes and poor economic-development prospects. Its public schools are among Ameria's most expensive, and poorly performing. Special-interest legislation gets shoved down the public's throat. Obviously, all is not well, and the overall approval ratings for the General Assembly are worse than dismal.

But voters had little or no choice here.

Nearly half of the House seats -- an extraordinary 49 percent -- were uncontested. Nearly half of the Senate seats -- 45 percent -- were uncontested.

Now add in those who had only token opposition -- poorly funded or little-regarded opponents who could not get within 20 percentage points. Nearly four-fifths of all House winners -- 79 percent -- had token or no opposition. For the Senate, 84 percent of winners had token or no competition.

And in only four House races and one Senate race were the margins of victory less than 5 percent.

Think of that. Those numbers would warm the hearts of members of the old Supreme Soviet.

This is profoundly unhealthy for Rhode Island. As Lord Acton trenchantly observed, "power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." No ethics reform ever conceived works as well as competitive elections to rein in politicians.

Unfortunately, if anything, the absolute power of legislative leaders grew more absolute last Tuesday.

A tidal wave of anti-Bush sentiment, combined with a huge turnout of Rhode Islanders determined to vote on the casino, seemed to give the dominant party here an extra edge of 5 points or more. Many casual voters weighed in on the casino, and then checked off the straight Democratic Party ticket, as a protest against Mr. Bush. One poll runner from Cranston told me there were 95 such straight Democratic ballots in his ward, compared with only 18 Republican ballots.

Statewide, that trend crushed a number of reform-minded Assembly candidates further down the ballot. One after another, arrogant incumbents who had seemed in deep trouble coasted to victory.

Even Governor Carcieri, the last real check on the legislature, almost got swept away in the flood. Elected with a puny "mandate" of 51 percent of the vote, he will govern in a weakened condition, facing an emboldened General Assembly.

Why is it this way in Rhode Island? There are many reasons:

Many voters are ill-informed and apathetic. They don't have a clue how much the state's special-interest politics affects their wallets and their children's prospects.

Many voters are members of special-interest groups that benefit from the status quo, or are related to those who do. They vote their narrow self-interest.

The state's opposition party, already a pathetic joke, was torn asunder by Stephen Laffey's ill-considered U.S. Senate primary campaign against Lincoln Chafee. Governor Carcieri's hand-picked party-leadership team performed miserably, and prospects for genuinely competitive elections will surely remain dim until the state GOP organization is blown up and rebuilt from scratch. Don't hold your breath waiting.

Incumbents who stood up to legislative leaders found themselves with opponents, while those who went with the flow faced no contests. That encourages lawmakers to choose the latter approach.

Rhode Island's antiquated election laws make it hard for citizens to participate in the process. Those who have an "in" with the political machine are much more likely to be equipped to to navigate the system and win a place on the ballot.

Few candidates are willing to come forward if they believe that they are doomed to fail.

It may seem just as well that Democrats thoroughly dominate the process in Rhode Island, since the Ocean State identifies strongly with that party. But there's an iron-clad law of human nature, well understood by America's founders: Corruption and arrogance flourish when people in power face no check on their behavior.

Until Rhode Island develops a healthier democracy, it's a safe bet that the public interest will be on life support.

Edward Achorn is The Journal's deputy editorial-pages editor. His e-mail address is eachorn@projo.com.