If there is a checklist for Election Day preparations, policy makers, candidates, and voter registration advocates have covered many bases for 2010: state legislation has moved to improve (or sometimes impede) voting rights; voter registration drives are technologically advancing; and campaign spending is reaching record heights. But, a major component of elections-voter outreach and voter turnout-remains to be seen. If 2008 turnout is an indicator for voter participation in the upcoming major elections, would this be an opportunity for the electorate to finally close its representational gaps?
What do voters really think about dramatic changes already underway?
by Steven Rosenfeld
Today's political chattering class-television barkers, talk radio hotheads, and even 2010's most visible candidates-keep telling Americans how angry and flustered we have become, and that the solution has to do with reeling in a government run amok.
After 15 years of declining compliance, several states are being brought into line with the National Voter Registration Act, a key federal election law that could help hundreds of thousands of citizens register to vote every year. Though some states are coming around due to lawsuits filed by voting rights organizations, others are voluntarily beginning to adhere to the NVRA. This week Project Vote released two new publications that explain what states are doing wrong and offer best practices for improvement.
Online voter registration is a leading election reform issue often touted as an avenue for modernizing voter registration for the 21st century. A new report by the Pew Center on the States says online voter registration is a cost- and time-effective method that is widely used and favored by people in states with established programs. With more states moving towards online registration, legislators and advocacy groups are moving to address concerns and find innovative new ways to ensure Americans can take advantage of the technology.
Engaging young citizens in the democratic process is an issue that lawmakers and voting rights advocates have long attempted to address. But with most youth voter engagement efforts primarily targeting college-attending youth (who make up less than half of the population of 18-24 year olds and are more likely to register and vote), the problem of underrepresented youth is likely to remain unsolved.
As voter education and access to voter registration seem to go hand-in-hand with greater voter participation rates, more lawmakers and advocates are siding with a simple solution for youth voter engagement: preregistration. However, as the state legislatures demonstrate this year, support for this reform could not happen fast enough.
A seemingly harmless trend in voter list maintenance is to compare voter lists between states and cancel apparent matches. However, this method not only violates federal law, but has the potential to put thousands of voters at risk of wrongful purging. As a result, one of the first states to launch this trend has taken steps to ensure that voters are not improperly removed from the rolls and perhaps will serve as an example to states that may be putting voters at risk through these interstate compacts.
While there is nothing wrong with states sharing information in an attempt to keep their voter lists up-to-date, some state election officials think that they are justified in immediately removing a voter from their rolls if the computerized interstate database comparison reveals an apparent match with the name and birth date of a voter who has more recently registered out of state. Removal based on such a match without adequate notice to the voter is not only unreliable, it's also illegal under the National Voter Registration Act.
After the state Supreme Court shut down Indiana's contentious photo voter ID law as unconstitutional last September for unfairly exempting absentee voters, this year's crop of voter ID bills appeared to be tweaked just enough to avoid major public scrutiny. This month, however, policymakers have returned to debating over traditional photo ID bills that pertain to voters who cast a ballot in person, and unfortunately, they are picking up in several states.
(This ties in directly to my diary last weekend about voter suppression as justified by the use of bogus "voter fraud" narratives. Tom Tancredo's recent remarks are another reminder of just how crucial this is. - promoted by Paul Rosenberg)
In observance of Black History month, it is fitting to revisit America's less than stellar record in the ongoing effort to move toward true equality. The key to equality was recognized more than 100 years ago when newly freed African Americans were given the basic rights of citizenship and voting under the 14th and 15th Amendments, though it was not until the 1960s that equality for African Americans and other disadvantaged groups was finally acknowledged on both a legal and cultural scale with the passage of the cornerstone Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts. Yet citizens of color continue to be underrepresented in U.S. electorate, and as recently as 2008 have been the target of thinly veiled voter intimidation and suppression efforts.
Although the Help America Vote Act of 2002 provided "fail-safe" provisional voting to prevent the unnecessary disenfranchisement of eligible citizens who show up at the polls to find that they are not on the rolls, there are still thousands of voters whose ballots are not being counted.
Last week, the Arizona Legislature introduced a Preregistration bill in the House, bringing it one step closer to allowing 16- and 17-year-olds to preregister to vote. If passed, Arizona would join Florida, Hawaii, North Carolina, and soon, Rhode Island in their efforts to engage youth before they may legally vote.
Sound unlikely? That's because the news comes from the state of Washington, where the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals essentially struck down the state's felon disenfranchisement law because it's racially discriminatory and violates the federal Voting Rights Act.
Tuesday was a good day for voting rights when a New Jersey federal judge ruled to extend restrictions against partisan voter suppression efforts that primarily target minority voters, effectively rejecting the Republican National Committee's claim that such protections are no longer needed.
Resolving a three-year old lawsuit filed against the state of Ohio that charged widespread violations of the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), parties in the case have submitted a settlement agreement to the court that should ensure voter registration opportunities for hundreds of thousands of Ohio public assistance clients. Evidence presented in the case had shown that many of Ohio's county public assistance offices were ignoring their responsibilities to provide voter registration to their low-income clients, as required by the NVRA.
Cross-posted to Project Vote’s Voting Matters Blog
The message that democracy works best when all citizens participate – including those reintegrating into society after serving time for felony convictions - is finally being heard by the public, the media, and the U.S. Congress. Whether the message will affect the change needed to enfranchise the millions of Americans who currently cannot represent their communities in the democratic process, it is encouraging to find more citizens recognize the value in voting rights restoration and its impact on rehabilitation.
Cross-Posted to Project Vote's Voting Matters Blog
State and federal law outlines, protects, and facilitates the voting rights of citizens. Under ideal circumstances, these laws make voting equally accessible to all eligible Americans without unnecessary barriers or hurdles. Unfortunately, the right to vote is too often misconstrued by the very officials charged with helping to protect and facilitate that right, leaving voters at best confused, and at worst disenfranchised.
