New Evaluation of Election Law Reform

by Wendy Underhill

At the beginning of this century the U.S. all of a sudden got excited about voting reform; everyone probably remembers why. One outcome of this sudden focus on elections (formerly a sleepy corner of public administration), was the passage of the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002.

HAVA did a whole bunch of things, including offering federal funds to the states for elections-related upgrades and creating a federal agency, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (U.S. EAC). The bulk of the law, however, established standards for states to meet on a host of elections-related issues. Funny thing: the same issues that were of concern in 2002 are still of concern in 2011.

We know this from looking at a newly updated report from the Congressional Research Service, HAVA and Election Reform: Overview and Issues (January 13, 2011).

From a states perspective, the good news is that the report says, right there in paragraph #1, "However, the law did not supplant state and local control over election administration." It is local jurisdictions, under the guidance of state policy makers and elections officials, that run elections by registering voters, printing ballots, organizing and supervising polling places, counting ballots and reporting results.

So what were those issues that HAVA addressed?

• Accessibility for people with disabilities
• Language support
• Manual audit capability for voting systems
• Military and overseas voting improvements
• Provisional ballots for those whose registration is in question
• Statewide voter registration databases
• Voting technology standards and security

The states have responded well to many of these requirements. All states now offer provisional ballots, although how they manage them varies, and access for people with disabilities has definitely improved.

On other measures, states are making progress. Statewide voter registration systems are almost all in place, although the report says that "issues associated with voter registration systems have become more prominent."  (NCSL's Feb. 21 Legislative Action Bulletin reports that 12 new states are considering bills that would allow voters to register to vote online.) States are slowly but surely making it possible for overseas voters to get their ballots back to the States in time to be counted, in part thanks to another federal push, the Military and Overseas Voters Empowerment Act of 2009.

Improvements in voting technology are a bit harder to judge. HAVA directed the new U.S. EAC to develop voluntary standards for computer-based voting systems that states could choose to adopt. After all these years, the report says that "there is no consensus on whether any one technology is best," referring to direct recording electronic systems or optical scan, the two most popular computer-based systems.

There's a reason that states haven't yet accomplished all that was set out with such optimism in HAVA: it's hard work! For those who are goal oriented, HAVA was full of good goals. But we also need to be process-oriented, and perfecting elections is a process that takes time.

Comments

[James Kester]

You know really, let's just examine the reality of voting. What % of citizens cast
a vote, vs. the % of citizens who know who
their local state representative is. Including, district # the member represents.
Expand this to voter's (aka citizen's) knowledge of county distict (if any), state,
district vs congressional district, and now
extend this poll to party membership.
If you could succeed in a 40% knowledge base
THIS WOULD REPRESENT A MILESTONE IN
ELECTION REFORM.
But, that's not going to happen is it.....