Registering Dissent: Contact Election Assistance Commission

[lady lib]

Registering Dissent
Steve Carbo
May 24, 2005
Carbo is the director of the Democracy Program at Demos, a national, nonpartisan public policy organization based in New York.

-snip-

In the last five years, millions of individuals—in the United States and around the world—have witnessed serious problems with American elections. In state after state, voters showed up at the polls only to find that their names had been left off the voter registration list. Some had submitted voter registration applications that were never processed in time for the election. Many others who had voted in the past were inexplicably purged from the rolls. Then there were the widespread reports of problem after problem with machine breakdowns, ballot shortages, too few poll workers, ballots ending up in the trash, and the list goes on and on. Something is very wrong with our democratic process

So now, states across the country are racing to meet a January 1 deadline for reforming our election systems—as they should be. The danger is that many may squander this once-in-a-generation opportunity.

-snip-

It is time for Americans to act now and let the EAC know that well-designed computerized, statewide voter registries are our best hope for accurate voter rolls that will allow eligible voters to cast a ballot that will be counted.

-snip-

Voters should expect strong, far-sighted leadership from the EAC. They need to show states the way to fix the voter registration problems and other flaws that taint elections year after year. Pick up the phone, or send an email or fax and tell them just that.

Contact Juliet Thompson, General Counsel to the Election Assistance Commission, at [phone], [phone] (fax), or [e-mail]. An electronic copy of the draft guidance can be found on the EAC’s website at http://www.eac.gov.

Full Article: http://www.tompaine.com/print/registering_dissent.php

Please call Ms. Thompson, DUers.

[TexasLawyer]

1. EAC has been neutered by the Rethugs

Election Reform Isn’t a High Priority Now, But It Should Be
May 17, 2005
By Richard L. Hasen,
Special to Roll Call

Who cares about election reform? Almost nobody. You’d think that after the 2000 presidential election debacle in Florida — and after narrowly avoiding post-election litigation in 2004 in Ohio — the states and the federal government would be using this time between elections to move ahead with serious election reform. After all, free and fair elections are a cornerstone of democratic government, and public confidence in our system of elections is quite low. Unfortunately, things are moving in exactly the wrong direction, and they won’t get better without stronger leadership from Congress, state legislatures and the press.

DeForest Soaries, a member and former chairman of the federal Election Assistance Commission, has resigned in protest over what he termed the lack of a “commitment to real reform from the federal government.” The resignation was barely or not even mentioned in most of the nation’s major newspapers. Only the Boston Globe chose to editorialize on what the resignation means for election reform prospects.

In Florida, the Republican Legislature is moving to consolidate the power to run elections in a secretary of state who is appointed by the Republican governor, thus taking power away from county canvassing boards, many dominated by Democrats. A similar battle over which party should control the election system in Maryland has been brewing between the Republican governor and the Democratic Legislature. The Democratic secretary of state in California had to resign amid allegations that he was using federal election reform money for partisan purposes.

<snip>

http://electionlawblog.org/archives/may17oped.htm

[lady lib]

2. Maybe it's more of a case of learned helplessness

than not caring, bur collective voice could be very loud if we take the time to make the phone call.