A Stitch in Haste

I must admit that I find very little, if anything, wrong with the final report of the Commission on Federal Election Reform on election reform generally and presidential primary reform specifically.

Congress has the power to regulate federal elections, including primaries. Traditionally, however, Congress has left it to the states to choose their own primary dates and format (i.e., open balloting versus the incomprehensible "caucus" system).

No more, if the report's recommendations are adopted:

--States, not local jurisdictions, should be in charge of voter registration, and state registration lists should be interconnected so voters could be purged automatically from the rolls in one state when they registered in another.

--Voters should be required to present photo ID cards at the polls, and states should provide free cards to voters without driver's licenses.

--States should make registration and voting more convenient with innovations like mobile registration vans and voting by mail and on the Internet.

--Electronic voting machines should make paper copies for auditing.

--In presidential election years, after the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primaries, the other states should hold regional primaries and caucuses at monthly intervals in March, April, May and June, with the order rotated.

I'm ecstatic over that first proposal. Interstate roll checks will address the despicable "snowbird voter" fraud that almost allowed Al Gore to steal the election from George W. Bush in 2000. Also, statewide administration of voter registration will help alleviate another underreported phenomenon: improper denial of student voter registration in college towns.

Electronic voting machines are inevitable, but whoever thought there could be ballot machines without a paper trial — as innocuous as an ATM receipt — was delusional.

The voter ID proposal, already causing a stir in Georgia, is a reasonable compromise. ID cards help deter voter fraud, yet if the cards are free, then the "poll tax" histrionics evaporate (see, e.g., my previous post).

As for regional primaries — I'm rather uninterested. I don't see why there can't be a single nationwide primary, but if rotating regional primaries represent a compromise and facilitate candidates visiting more states more often, then I suppose it's a good thing. The current "Iowa - New Hampshire - Super Tuesday" timeline strikes me as rather moronic.

Now perhaps we can move on to Electoral College reform and a fresh look at the vastly superior District Method for allocating electoral votes.

UPDATE #1: Just because I think Fark is cool, and Fark thinks 4,755 dead people voting is cool, that doesn't mean I think 4,755 dead people voting is cool.

UPDATE #2: The Wall Street Jounral ($) concurs:

The racially charged analogy is bunk because the panel recommended that identification cards be provided at no cost to those who need them. And photo ID if anything makes it significantly less likely that someone would be wrongly turned away at the polls, due to out-of-date registration lists or for more insidious reasons. In any case, the tacit acknowledgment by Mr. Carter and most of the other liberals on the commission that the integrity of the ballot is every bit as important as access to the ballot is a welcome one.

The idea that voter ID hurts relatively disempowered poor rural black voters, rather than protecting them from potential abuse of discretion by election officials, is ludicrous at best and brazen race-baiting at worst.