Twenty-five years after it was enacted, some state lawmakers want to end Wisconsin's walk-in Election Day voter registration system.
Sen. Margaret Farrow, R-Elm Grove, says irregularities reported in this month's election -- such as some Marquette University students claiming that they voted multiple times -- show the system should be dropped in favor of one that provides more security.
Wisconsin is one of six states that allow residents to register and vote on the same day. New voters need only provide proof of residence -- ranging from a driver's license to a utility bill, lease or other documents showing their current address.
The state Elections Board estimates that 15 percent of voters in each presidential election are walk-in voters who have not previously registered.
Unlike in other states, there is no statewide, central registry of Wisconsin voters. Voting registration records are kept in each individual community.
The relative ease of registration has been credited with raising voter turnout in Wisconsin well above the national average.
But Farrow contends making registration requirements more stringent won't have much effect on voter participation.
"I'm not trying to bar anyone from the election or chill the turnout,'' she said in an interview. "But the driving reason for (changing the law) is that 99.9 percent of the people in our state are honest -- and what they need is to be sure there's some integrity in the process, too.''
Wisconsin enacted same-day voter registration in 1975, shortly after the U.S. Constitution was amended to give 18-year-olds the right to vote.
Sen. Fred Risser, D-Madison, who co-authored the legislation, said the state measure was intended to help students vote.
At the time, state voter registration laws were unclear. "We didn't know which students could vote and which ones couldn't,'' he said.
The bill included a statement of intent that "the Legislature finds that the vote is the single most critical act in our system of government; that voter registration was not intended to and should not prevent voting; that registration should simply be a remedy against fraud and that the burden should be placed upon administrators, not the electorate.
"The Legislature further finds it is extremely difficult for workers to find time to visit a registration office that is open only during working hours; that transportation costs to remote locations impede registration, and that the act of personal registration is a major cause of limited electoral participation. Therefore ... the Legislature finds it imperative to expand voter registration procedures.''
Risser argues that whatever problems have been found in the current system could be fixed by better enforcement of existing laws -- such as by more careful examination of new registrants' proof of residence.
Some state officials -- such as Lt. Gov. Scott McCallum and Rep. Scott Walker, R-Wauwatosa, don't support abolishing Election Day registration. But they do believe voters should have to provide better identification, such as a driver's license or state-issued photo ID.
Rep. David Travis, D-Madison, who helped draft the law as a Senate staffer, said those requirements would bar many already marginalized in society -- among them elderly voters who have stopped driving or poor people without cars.
Other voters don't make up their minds who to vote for until days before the election, while those who have moved recently don't think of changing their registration until the last minute, he said.
Travis notes that if the walk-in registration law is repealed, federal law would require other state and local agencies -- such as the Department of Transportation when residents renew their driver's licenses -- to register voters.
That, he said, would create a nightmare for local elections officials who would get registration forms from numerous sources.
Farrow disagrees. She says local officials she's talked with consider Election Day registrations a major hassle and would prefer to spread their workload over the entire year.
Travis contends there's no need to change.
"The system has worked just fine for 25 years, and now a couple of college students in Milwaukee pull a prank and everyone is looking at ways to get rid of it,'' he said.
By SEAN CAVANAGH, SHANNON O'BOYE and CHRISTY McKERNEY Sun-SentinelStaff Writer
Web-posted: 11:13 p.m. Nov. 19, 2000
PLANTATION-- Five days into hand recounts, Broward County's elections panel moved to loosen its rules on what ballots can be recorded as votes -- unless Florida's highest court forbids that change.
The switch was proposed on Sunday, midway through the county's hand tally of 588,000 ballots, which began last week.
But Broward County's three-member canvassing board agreed to wait to see if Florida's Supreme Court addresses the potentially crucial issue in a hearing today, before putting the new, broader guidelines into effect.
And the board members said the new policy would force them to review only a limited number of ballots--rather than starting the entire recount again.
The proposal delighted Democrats and horrified Republicans, who claimed board members were crumbling under pressure to rustle up more votes for Al Gore in heavily Democratic Broward.
"The Democrats are not happy with the small numbers coming out of Broward County for Vice President Al Gore, so now they're trying to change the standards," said Ed Pozzuoli, the county's GOP chairman. "They're putting on a full-court press to try to change the process mid-stream, and that's blatantly unfair."
So far, with 425 of Broward's 609 precincts counted by hand, Gore had picked up another 109 votes on opponent George W. Bush. On Friday, Gore gained another 16 votes on Bush, in overseas ballots.
Until now, Broward's canvassing board had agreed to count ballots as votes only when at least two corners of the "chad," or bits of paper meant to be punched out, were detached.
But after listening to the advice of County Attorney Edward Dion, board members on Sunday voted to consider counting indented or "dimpled" ballots, along with those that were partially punched out. A similar standard was being used by Palm Beach County officials on Sunday, who were putting aside some dimpled ballots for later consideration as votes, in their hand recount.
"We want everyone who intended to vote for president counted," said Broward canvassing board member Suzanne Gunzburger, a Democratic county commissioner who voted for the change. "We changed our policy but (it won't take effect) today."
If they use the new chad standard, Broward's elections workers would not have to go over all of the county's ballots again, Gunzburger said. Instead, the counting teams working this week in the windowless, hurricane-resistant county operations center in Plantation would only re-examine "undervotes," or ballots that had not been fully punched. Those ballots have been separated, and put in envelopes, throughout the counting.
There was no firm estimate on the number of votes at stake, but Democrats and Republicans gave estimates ranging from a few hundred to up to a thousand. It was widely presumed by both sides, however, that the majority of those ballots would favor Gore.
At first, the board members appeared to vote 3-0 for the new standard, with Gunzburger, Judge Robert W. Lee, a Democrat, and Supervisor of Elections Jane Carroll, a Republican, all supporting it.
But Carroll later made it clear she did not support the change. The vote, she thought, had been simply to keep the current chad standard, to wait to see if the Supreme Court ruled today, she said.
In any case, Carroll's objections were so strong that she had her attorney send a separate legal brief to the Supreme Court for their consideration today, saying she was "troubled by the conclusion reached by the County Attorney's Office."
"I don't agree with hand-counting at all, but if we're going to do hand-counting (the two-corner chad) is the standard I think we should apply," Carroll said.
Dion, The Republican county attorney, said he advised the board to change the policy after studying a court decision made by Palm Beach Circuit Judge Jorge Labarga last week. The judge ruled that Palm Beach County's board was obligated to consider dimpled ballots, to judge whether they clearly showed a voter's intent.
Dion also pointed to a decision offered Friday by Broward Circuit Judge John A. Miller, which he said instructed canvassing boards to look at a voter's intent, when studying a ballot.
But Republicans on Sunday insisted Miller's opinion was not a final order, and that the judge only said Broward's board could lower the standard, if it wanted. They also noted that another of the county's attorneys, Norm Ostrau, said last week that the board should choose a standard and stick to it.
"We question why the County Attorney's Office has reversed its position in this matter," Pozzuoli said.
Sean Cavanagh can be reached at 954-572-2009, or [email protected].
By SEAN CAVANAGH, SHANNON O'BOYE and CHRISTY McKERNEY Sun-SentinelStaff Writer
Web-posted: 11:13 p.m. Nov. 19, 2000
PLANTATION-- Five days into hand recounts, Broward County's elections panel moved to loosen its rules on what ballots can be recorded as votes -- unless Florida's highest court forbids that change.
The switch was proposed on Sunday, midway through the county's hand tally of 588,000 ballots, which began last week.
But Broward County's three-member canvassing board agreed to wait to see if Florida's Supreme Court addresses the potentially crucial issue in a hearing today, before putting the new, broader guidelines into effect.
And the board members said the new policy would force them to review only a limited number of ballots--rather than starting the entire recount again.
The proposal delighted Democrats and horrified Republicans, who claimed board members were crumbling under pressure to rustle up more votes for Al Gore in heavily Democratic Broward.
"The Democrats are not happy with the small numbers coming out of Broward County for Vice President Al Gore, so now they're trying to change the standards," said Ed Pozzuoli, the county's GOP chairman. "They're putting on a full-court press to try to change the process mid-stream, and that's blatantly unfair."
So far, with 425 of Broward's 609 precincts counted by hand, Gore had picked up another 109 votes on opponent George W. Bush. On Friday, Gore gained another 16 votes on Bush, in overseas ballots.
Until now, Broward's canvassing board had agreed to count ballots as votes only when at least two corners of the "chad," or bits of paper meant to be punched out, were detached.
But after listening to the advice of County Attorney Edward Dion, board members on Sunday voted to consider counting indented or "dimpled" ballots, along with those that were partially punched out. A similar standard was being used by Palm Beach County officials on Sunday, who were putting aside some dimpled ballots for later consideration as votes, in their hand recount.
"We want everyone who intended to vote for president counted," said Broward canvassing board member Suzanne Gunzburger, a Democratic county commissioner who voted for the change. "We changed our policy but (it won't take effect) today."
If they use the new chad standard, Broward's elections workers would not have to go over all of the county's ballots again, Gunzburger said. Instead, the counting teams working this week in the windowless, hurricane-resistant county operations center in Plantation would only re-examine "undervotes," or ballots that had not been fully punched. Those ballots have been separated, and put in envelopes, throughout the counting.
There was no firm estimate on the number of votes at stake, but Democrats and Republicans gave estimates ranging from a few hundred to up to a thousand. It was widely presumed by both sides, however, that the majority of those ballots would favor Gore.
At first, the board members appeared to vote 3-0 for the new standard, with Gunzburger, Judge Robert W. Lee, a Democrat, and Supervisor of Elections Jane Carroll, a Republican, all supporting it.
But Carroll later made it clear she did not support the change. The vote, she thought, had been simply to keep the current chad standard, to wait to see if the Supreme Court ruled today, she said.
In any case, Carroll's objections were so strong that she had her attorney send a separate legal brief to the Supreme Court for their consideration today, saying she was "troubled by the conclusion reached by the County Attorney's Office."
"I don't agree with hand-counting at all, but if we're going to do hand-counting (the two-corner chad) is the standard I think we should apply," Carroll said.
Dion, The Republican county attorney, said he advised the board to change the policy after studying a court decision made by Palm Beach Circuit Judge Jorge Labarga last week. The judge ruled that Palm Beach County's board was obligated to consider dimpled ballots, to judge whether they clearly showed a voter's intent.
Dion also pointed to a decision offered Friday by Broward Circuit Judge John A. Miller, which he said instructed canvassing boards to look at a voter's intent, when studying a ballot.
But Republicans on Sunday insisted Miller's opinion was not a final order, and that the judge only said Broward's board could lower the standard, if it wanted. They also noted that another of the county's attorneys, Norm Ostrau, said last week that the board should choose a standard and stick to it.
"We question why the County Attorney's Office has reversed its position in this matter," Pozzuoli said.
Sean Cavanagh can be reached at 954-572-2009, or [email protected].
Al Gore is facing long odds - statistically speaking - to make up the 930-vote gap between him and George W. Bush in the Florida hand recount on which he has pinned his hopes.
"It's unlikely," Bruce Hansen, economics professor at the University of Wisconsin, said of Gore's chances of picking up enough votes to win the presidency.
Hansen said Gore could win an extremely narrow victory - perhaps as close as a single vote - if he gets lucky, under statistical projections.
But in any event, a hand recount will not be the slam-dunk that many Gore supporters were counting on.
As of yesterday, Hansen was projecting that a recount in Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties would boost the vice president by anywhere from a low of 533 votes to a high of 934 votes.
Both the top and low ends of the range each have only about a 2.5 percent chance of occurring under the projections, he said.
And to get to that top end - which as of yesterday's totals would give Gore only a four-vote lead - "Gore will need several things working in his favor," Hansen said.
One of those things would be for Gore to get one so-called "pregnant chad" - or a dimpled ballot hole - for every two "hanging chads" that go his way, Hansen said.
Hanging chads are ballots that have pieces of paper hanging from the holes next to a candidate's name. They have been accepted as valid votes, as have ballots that are dimpled, rather than pushed all the way through, by some recounting counties.
If the recount results in that 1-to-2 dimpled-to-hanging chads ratio, "then we could get to a dead-even heat," Hansen said.
"It all comes down to dimples," Hansen said. "It's pretty shocking to [say] that a presidential race has come down to that, but that's what happens when it's a 50-50 race."
John Irons, an economics professor at Amherst College in Massachusetts, thinks Gore has better chances, but still gives the vice president only a 50 percent shot at pulling ahead through a recount.
"But I believe that hinges on whether you count the pregnant chads," he said.
And Irons says Gore supporters are wrong to assume that the 19 votes he picked up in an initial test hand recount in 1 percent of Palm Beach County precincts can be extrapolated to 1,900 votes for 100 percent of the precincts.
"Those were majority, very Democratic precincts," Irons noted, pointing out that less-heavily Democratic areas would not be as likely to follow that projected trend. "You're unsure if that 19 is going to hold for the rest [of the counties]."
Judge Charles Burton, chairman of the all-important Palm Beach canvassing board, said the hand count has not shown any appreciable swing either way.
"I'm not doing the tally, quite obviously, at this stage, but my general impression is no dramatic swing in the votes," he said.
