Florida: The problem with mail-in voting

This week, Florida state Democratic Party chair Karen Thurman has made the latest stab at resolving the battle over her state's 210 primary delegates -- nixed after the state jumped a week ahead in the 2008 electoral calendar.

Her plan: A state-wide primary re-vote, consisting of mail-in ballots and 50 regional voting offices for "disadvantaged communities" (more than Louisiana set up after Hurricane Katrina). The price-tag: $10-$12 million.

How likely is it to happen? That's not clear, given that Florida's entire Congressional delegation has come out against "any redo of any kind." Both the Clinton and Obama campaigns are refraining from publicly commenting on the proposal.

Earlier proposals had just focused on mail-in votes (for about half the cost), but drew criticism over fears that mail-in voting could bypass many voters.

Those fears are justified. Last year, the non-partisan group Project Vote did an exhaustive study of mail-in voting, which gained favor among voting reform advocates after Oregon instituted "vote by mail" in 1998. As of last year, 32 bills in 18 legislatures promoted some form of VBM.

It's true that voting by mail brings benefits; Oregon's success in boosting turnout alone has been touted as a reason to embrace VBM. But the results are mixed, to say the least. Voting by mail risks disenfranchising those who move, which tend to be low-income, poor and African-American and Latino voters:

First class mail, as its name might imply, does not treat everyone equally. In fact, it discriminates against low-income communities and dense urban areas where residents move more frequently and not every adult shares the same family name. [...]

Project Vote is especially concerned about the effects of mobility among people of lower income levels. Twenty-one percent of households with incomes under $25,000 have moved in the past year, compared to 12 percent of households with incomes greater than $100,000. Almost one in three renters moved, compared to one in 11 homeowners.

Most interestingly, new research suggests that while VBM may boost turnout, it does so largely among those who are predisposed to voting anyway -- while erecting barriers to those who have been historically disenfranchised:

To the extent that VBM increases turnout in Oregon it does so by retaining voters who are occasional rather than habitual voters. Further, these voters are demographically similar to habitual voters. In other words, VBM does nothing to expand the electorate in ways that make it more representative of the voting age population. In fact, as MIT political scientist Adam Berinsky writes: “VBM in Oregon accentuated the stratification of the electorate. Specifically, VBM mobilized those already predisposed to vote—those individuals who are long-term residents and who are registered partisans—to turn out at higher rates than before.”

The Project Vote researchers point to two others problems with mail-in voting -- possible fraud, and manipulation by election officials -- which, while important concerns, can be over-stated (consider the Department of Justice's discredited crusade for "voting integrity") and appear to be based largely on anecdotal evidence.

But voting by mail clearly presents Florida with a new set of problems, which the addition of 50 regional voting offices may or may not adequately address.

UPDATE: AP is now reporting that Thurman's plan is "unlikely," so perhaps it's all moot.

Labels: barack obama, democratic party, Election 2008, Florida, hillary clinton