State of Elections

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Online Voter Registration: A Small Step in the Right Direction

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Lawmakers in the Michigan House recently passed HB 4539 and 4540, which together lay out the principles to allow for the electronic submission of voter registration applications. The change would allow for citizens with access to the Internet to register online by filling out a form similar to the paper form, and signing computerelectronically. The form is then automatically printed at the local clerk’s office. Arizona was the first to implement online voter registration in 2003, followed by Washington in 2008, with six other states following last year.  Other states have proposed similar legislation, and online registration continues to grow in popularity.  In Arizona, 25% of all new voter registrations took place online in its first year and within a few years that number reached 70%. Michigan is expected to see similar numbers. The bills are currently headed to the Senate for further review.

This new legislation has several clear aims. The costs associated with online registrations are significantly lower than paper forms. Arizona spends nearly 83 cents processing each paper voter registration form while their online voter registrations may be completed with a cost of only 3 cents. Postage for delivery and receipt is not necessary with online registration because the form is immediately and automatically printed off at the clerk’s office after the registrant submits online. The registrant then has the option to print off a copy on their printer for personal records. This process would also cut down the amount of information that needs to be manually entered from paper forms, which would help prevent errors.  Michigan in particular experienced difficulties with third-party form falsification last fall with groups like ACORN. Michigan hopes to eliminate such risks  by taking the registration forms out of those group’s hands and giving voters this simple and streamlined way of registering.

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Weekly Wrap Up

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Every week, State of Elections brings you the latest news in state election law.

– Implementation of the Tennessee Voter Confidence Act has been delayed until 2012. The Act, which would require paper ballots in all Tennessee elections, has been highly controversial and strongly opposed by Republicans in the legislature.  Lt. Gov Ron Ramsey even declared that delaying the bill was his No. 1 priority.  Bernie Ellis, a leading proponent of the Act, posted this editorial on State of Elections in December.  For more background, check out this article by Drew Staniewski.

– A federal judge in Arizona appears ready to dramatically change that state’s system of funding elections.  Under Arizona’s Clean Elections system, certain candidates receive government funding for their campaigns.  The system is designed to allow less well-funded candidates to compete with more affluent opponents.  Judge Roslyn Silver, however, has written a draft order that would strike down these matching funds as unconstitutional.

– Washington Attorney General Rob McKenna and Secretary of State Sam Reed have announced that they will appeal the 9th Circuit Court’s decision in Farrakhan v. Gregoire.  The decision restored the voting rights of felons in Washington.  For more of State of Election’s coverage of the debate over felon voting rights, go here and here.

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Weekly Wrap Up

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Every week, State of Elections brings you the latest news in state election law.

– Winter break at William and Mary is over, and State of Elections is excited to return to a  full time posting schedule. New articles will be posted every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, beginning on January 11th.

– Senator Chris Dodd has announced he will not seek reelection in 2010.  During his time in the Senate,  Dodd proposed some sweeping changes to voter registration laws.  Take a look at S. 17, Dodd’s proposed “Voting Opportunity and Technology Enhancement Rights Act of 2005”.  If it had been passed, S. 17 would have required states to allow voters to register on election day, and also would have enabled voters to register electronically via the Internet.

– The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that the disenfranchisement of felons violates the federal Voting Rights Act.  According to the court, the criminal justice system is so “infected” with racism that limiting the right of felons to vote is contrary to the Act’s prohibition against the denial of voting rights on account of race.  The court’s opinion can be read in full here.

– The Rhode Island Senate and House has enacted legislation allowing 16 and 17 year olds to “pre-register” to vote.  Those that pre-register will be automatically added to the voter rolls will they turn 18.  The bill had been previously vetoed by Rhode Island Governor Donald Carcieri, but the veto was overridden by the legislature.   For more information on pre-registration, see FairVote.org’s fact sheet.

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Weekly Wrap Up

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Every week, State of Elections brings you the latest news in state election law.

– The U.S. Census bureau has released its population estimates, and if their estimates are correct, 8 states stand to gain Congressional seats in 2010, and 10 states will lose seats.

– An editorial in the St. Petersburg Times accuses Florida’s “No Match, No Vote” law of disenfranchising thousands of minority voters during the 2008 presidential election.  The law denies voter registration to any applicant whose name on the registration form does not match the Social Security or Florida driver’s license databases.

– The Supreme Court has held its last session of 2009, and still has not released its decision in Citizen United v. Federal Election Commission. The Court was expected to overrule existing precedents that allowed the government to limit the amount corporations could spend on campaigns.  However, the long delay has fueled speculation that the Court’s decision may not be as clear cut as expected.  For a review of the issues involved in Citizen United, see this transcript of oral arguments and this analysis of the possible implications of the case.

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Vote by Mail: Wave of the Future?

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In 1998 Oregon voted by a wide margin to expand its experimental vote-by-mail system to all primary and general elections in the state. Oregon was followed by Washington, which with the exception of a single county, has adopted a similar vote-by-mail system. The typical voting procedure in these states is that three weeks to a month before the election the state mails ballots to all registered voters who fill them out and have until the night of the election to return them via mail or by dropping them off at a county office. Now, in 2009, the model pioneered by the northwest is being tested in the east, as New Jersey is moving towards its own version of the vote-by-mail system. New Jersey has allowed voters to vote absentee without restriction since 2005, but the off-year elections in November 2009 were the first test of a new system that more fully embraced the vote-by-mail concept, by removing any pretense to the ballot being for absentee purposes.  This system differs from that embraced by Oregon and Washington in that voting by mail is not mandatory, it’s just another option in addition to more traditional polling systems. New Jersey embraced the program for the same reason that states like Oregon and Washington did, in an attempt to boost voter participation by making voting more convenient. The New Jersey Secretary of State touts the new program as removing any excuse for Jerseyites not to vote, and Oregon boasts of an 86 percent voter turnout in the 2004 Presidential Election and a 70 percent turnout in the 2006 midterms.

It remains to be seen, however, whether the vote-by-mail model is truly successful in driving up voter participation. The change to New Jersey’s early voting law in 2009 was likely a response to the lack of success from its 2005 expanded absentee voter law. According to numbers tabulated by the New Jersey Secretary of State, in every statewide primary and general election from 2003 to the 2008 primaries, absentee voting never amounted to more than .05 percent of ballots cast.  Even Oregon and Washington, the two states that have implemented mandatory vote-by-mail systems, the results may not be as remarkable as advertised. [Read more…] about Vote by Mail: Wave of the Future?