Editor’s note: The following editorial appeared in Friday’s Philadelphia Inquirer.

Events Tuesday from Dover, Pa., to Topeka, Kan., make one thing clear: Everyone should follow local school board elections – and vote.

On Tuesday, voters in Dover kicked out eight of the nine members of a school board that decided intelligent design (ID) should be taught in ninth-grade science classes.

One seat is being disputed, but that won’t change the outcome: ID – the argument that natural selection is an insufficient explanation for the complexity of life forms, that an intelligent force must be involved – just got rejected at the polls.

That’s not the end of the story in Dover, since Judge John E. Jones III is expected to rule by year’s end whether the old school board’s decision is lawful or not. What does the new board do if he says yes (the wrong decision)? Not clear.

Also on Tuesday, the Kansas state school board voted 6-4 to rewrite state science standards. In bland but crafty language, the standards (which start in 2008) portray the theory of evolution as controversial, even inadequate – a portrait that ranges from misleading to simply false. The standards also redefine the word science, making room for non-natural explanations and phenomena. Hello, ID!

Under Kansas law, local school boards control what’s taught. But the state board determines the content of state assessment tests. Rejiggering the standards obviously puts pressure on teachers to cover ID in class.

Five states, including Pennsylvania, now require that students learn about scientific evidence both for and against the theory of evolution. Problem is, there isn’t any evidence against it. True, the fossil record is not complete – but that doesn’t constitute evidence against evolution. Every piece of concrete scientific evidence richly supports evolution. But, then, this is politics, not science.

Local elections often are sleepy affairs. When the majority stays home, zealous special interests – who will vote down to the last person – can and do win. Those who stay home bear as much responsibility for bad outcomes as those who win.

Despite the worldwide notice the Dover ID trial garnered, only 16 percent of Dover voters cast ballots.

Low turnouts contribute to unstable results. Kansas voters are not rock-solid anti-Darwinists. In 1999, conservative board members tried to remove all mention of evolution from state science standards. Two of them got booted in the next primary elections, and board control shifted to moderates. In 2001, evolution was reinstated. But conservatives fought their way back into power. And the balance may be rebalanced. Four of five Kansas board seats up for a vote next year are held by conservatives.

Welcome to democracy in action. The give-and-take between school boards and communities is often uneasy and bruising, and never finished. That’s as it should be, even when the results are, as in Kansas, awful. Election confers legitimacy. Those who don’t like the results should rally people who agree with them and try to win some elections.

Whether the results are delightful or dumb, it’s still democracy: not always intelligent, always in evolution. And that’s no theory.