Comments on: Federal Legislation May Doom September Primaries

By: Jim Riley

Jim Riley — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 06:03:13 +0000

#7 The problem is trying to connect several 1000 local elections authorities with 100s of thousands of individual voters overseas.

If a few voters get missed, so be it. It happens in regular elections where someone gets ill just before the election, or unexpectedly has to leave town.

By: Jim Riley

Jim Riley — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 05:54:47 +0000

At the time of Smith v Allwright the primary in Texas was in August. By the time of American Party of Texas v. White it was in June. It is now in March, and there were proposals to move it to February.

Meanwhile there are proposals to permit 17 YO to vote in the primary since they will be be able to vote in the general. If the primary was moved to February, arguably some 16 YO should have the right to sign petitions (the petition collection period would begin in October).

If the government can’t manage two elections within a month of each other, they need to get rid of the Australian ballot. Let the political parties or individual voters prepare their own ballots.

By: Bob Richard

Bob Richard — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 23:22:26 +0000

An alternative to moving the primary might be to send each overseas voter a ranked ballot, as is done in Louisiana, Arkansas, South Carolina and some Illinois cities in top-two runoff elections. Some details would need to be worked out, because these are partisan primary elections rather that first rounds. See this FairVote site. All of the many ideas for using fax, email, consulates, military chain of command, etc., can help some voters, or help voters some of the time, but none of them can reach all voters. Their coverage is spotty, and such machinery is prone to frequent bureaucratic breakdowns.

By: Joyce McCloy

Joyce McCloy — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 22:49:19 +0000

September is a bit late for a primary anyway. Election officials need time between elections.

It can take 6 weeks to get the printed ballots and ballot programming done, and things always go wrong.

I can’t see why having an earlier primary is bad.

By: Jim Riley

Jim Riley — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 18:38:47 +0000

Overseas voters would register through the federal government, which would transmit the registration to the home state, which would have the authority to approve or reject the registration. States are already required to maintain a statewide registration roll, so they have a mechanism in place to coordinate with local election administrators.

Whenever a local election authority conducts an election, they would send the ballot to the state which would electronically transmit it to the federal government which would direct it to the correct overseas polling location. The overseas polling location would be responsible for communication with the voter (informing of upcoming elections, etc.).

It would be a state option whether an overseas voter is permitted to participate in non-federal elections.

By: Deemer from California

Deemer from California — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 15:54:02 +0000

Eventhough Jim Riley has a sensible idea for overseas
voters, I can see one big problem from the start. Currently, there are well over a quarter million precincts scattered throughout these United States. Over 3,000 Counties and Independent Cities administer the elections. The sorting out of which ballot each Overseas Citizen can use would be an enormous undertaking that I seriously doubt the Defense and State Departments would rather not have to deal with. That’s of course not including whatever the cost would be of holding the voting on election day. If they began holding elections for Federal office it would probably bacome untenable to decline to do it for ALL local elections.

The one way out that I can see is would be a specific Federal law that applied to both primary and general Federal elections exclsively. When a citizen did move overseas for personal or business reasons they could, while registering with a local Consulate or Embassy say on the form where there are presently registered to vote. Clearly, a citizen chosing to not register to vote while living within these United States should have no capacity to vote while living outside the U.S. They now don’t have a domestic home address for voting.
Military personnel would be handled differently since they DO have a recognized domestic address.

There is probably something else on this item that I’ve
forgotten to put in so if someone else figures it out please put it in here.

By: 2010 Primaries in NY: Could the month be changed? « OntheWilderSide

2010 Primaries in NY: Could the month be changed? « OntheWilderSide — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 13:31:52 +0000

[...] Primaries in NY: Could the month be changed? from Ballot Access News Federal Legislation May Doom September Primaries August 28th, 2009 The bill moving through Congress [...]

By: Demo Rep

Demo Rep — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 05:19:18 +0000

P.R. legislative bodies and A.V. executive / judicial offices.

NO party hack primaries, caucuses and conventions are needed.

ONE election per cycle — NOT atomic physics.

By: Jim Riley

Jim Riley — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 04:30:37 +0000

The federal government should operate polling places overseas at military bases and consulates, and coordinate registration of overseas residents so that they can be included in the census. The States could fax ballots to these polling places and they could be returned to their respective States within days of the election.