The vote-early-and-vote-often state

© 2008 by Michael Swickard, Ph.D.

“The time has come for all good men to rise above principle.” – Former Louisiana Gov. Huey Long

It usually gets a wry laugh when people say that we should “Vote early and often.” Some think it describes New Mexico. Chicago Mayor William Thompson said it around 1920, and it was repeated by Chicago Gangster Al Capone and, in the 60s, by Chicago Mayor Richard Daley.

My Chicago friends laugh about the quote and then quote from the movie Lonesome Dove: “A man who wouldn’t cheat for a poke don’t want one bad enough.” And W. C. Fields: “Anything worth having is a thing worth cheating for.”

The underlying principle is, “The ends justify the means.” These people feel they cannot trust “The Citizens” to elect the “right” candidates. Much like in Lake Wobegon High School, as Garrison Keillor writes, where the homecoming queen is elected by a secret vote that is counted by the teacher who discards the “wrong votes” so the “right” candidate wins.

We Americans have a pristine view of elections in the abstract and a Chicago view in the practical. In New Mexico there is the perception that our elections are like “Little Chicago.”

That the authorities do not catch many people cheating is proof, say detractors, that the elections are not being manipulated. In reality, no one can know since the controls that would assure completely fair elections are missing.

Not to say some of the data is not troubling. In one southern New Mexico precinct there were significantly more votes on the machine than signatures of the voters. This meant there were votes from people who were not signed in. It was treated as a clerical error. While many people viewed it as fraud, no political leader would investigate.

Further, people in New Mexico continue to vote even in death. In the last presidential election an Albuquerque woman came to vote in an eye-catching, stylish dress. Later, that same woman was back and still wearing the dress. The voter was challenged by the Republican watcher. She and her husband used their last name and first initial which was the same initial. Both lived at the same address. The poll watcher started to review her earlier signature.

Seeing that she was caught, the woman admitted that her husband had died many years earlier but she had voted for him for many years because “she knew how he would have voted.” In a less flashy dress, no one would have noticed this.

Discouraging cheaters

Despite possible scummy elections, there is something worse. The concern about our elections has an effect that most people are not seeing. Namely, if honest citizens think the elections are fixed, they may choose to skip voting, thereby weakening our democracy.

This is the problem with Republicans in New Mexico yakking about the possibility of fraud. It shrinks their already minuscule influence. As more Republicans embrace the concept that the elections are not honest, less go vote.

Will we fix our holes in the election process? Not likely. At the very least each polling table should have a streaming Web camera so that everyone who signs in is recorded on video. If people want to take the time and effort, it can be established if those in line match the valid voters. I cannot see how being on camera would intimidate anyone except cheaters since we are on camera much of the time in stores.

But what about requiring more identification? We should know who is voting. What we are discussing is by what standard people are identified. Can we just trust they are telling the truth? Where I was raised, that would work, but in today’s society, it would allow cheating.

We might take a lesson from stores who do financial transactions. They require a level of identification, but do so with a minimum of hassle. If the need to identify the customer affected that customer’s desire to be in the store, bad things happen for the store.

Increasing the scrutiny of the voters at the polling table, if done well, would have no real effect other than to discourage cheaters. My concern is that the government could make things worse than they need to be.

Government foolishness

As I get older I find myself less inclined to put up with government foolishness. Example: I drive further now rather than go through the Transportation Security Administration airline checkpoints. It is not a question of having something to hide; I do not. Rather, it is the feeling I get in the TSA line: shoes off, cattle-at-slaughter in line with pockets turned out, a turn-your-head-and-cough kind of hassle. Most flying is discretionary for me, so I now drive sometimes when I would have previously flown.

If we put the TSA in charge of elections (ridiculous) some voters might have my same feeling about skipping voting because of the climate in the election polling place. This is not likely to happen since those leaders winning office have shown a great reluctance to change any of the methods that led to their own election. Perhaps, like Huey Long said, “One of these days the people of Louisiana are going to get good government; and they aren’t going to like it.”

Despite the doubts I hope all people go vote (once) and believe in the electoral process. Any less condemns us to a lesser democracy, if that.

Swickard is a weekly columnist for this site. You can reach him at michael@swickard.com.