Opinion of automatic voter registration

[greenforest32]

http://www.demos.org/blog/9/23/14/national-voter-registration-day-its-time-universal-voter-registration

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[H. Ross Peron]

FP of course

[Blue3]

Why would anyone be against this?

[Bleeding heart conservative, HTMLdon]

Horrible policy.

1) Registering to vote isn't that hard.  If you can't be bothered with completing a simple form, how much time are you going to spend learning about candidates or issues?  Voting and registering should be as easy and simple as possible, but you should have to take some sort of proactive action in order to accomplish either task.

2) As voter registration databases are public record in most states, automatic voter registration essentially creates an index of every citizen, which raises privacy concerns.  If you want to be off the grid (and not vote), you should be able to.

[Miles]

FP of course

[dead0man]

Probably a dumb question but what are the many unnecessary bureaucratic barriers that block the ability of eligible persons to register to vote.  I don't recall there being any when I registered, but I'm white and not young or poor so perhaps my privilege helped me out and I just didn't notice.

[politicus]

The only sensible way to go.

As voter registration databases are public record in most states, automatic voter registration essentially creates an index of every citizen, which raises privacy concerns.  If you want to be off the grid (and not vote), you should be able to.

While I  can emphasise with this, it isn't really possible to be off the grid for an extended period of time in a modern society.

[TDAS04]

FP of course

[Indy Texas]

I think Texas may already do this. All I know is that I received a voter registration card in the mail when I turned 18. I never asked for it. I never had to fill out any forms. All I had to do was bring it with me when I went to go vote in November. And since then, I have received one in the mail every year.

[ElectionsGuy]

I think Texas may already do this. All I know is that I received a voter registration card in the mail when I turned 18. I never asked for it. I never had to fill out any forms. All I had to do was bring it with me when I went to go vote in November. And since then, I have received one in the mail every year.

If Texas is indeed doing this, do you know why the turnout there is one of the lowest in the country?

FP

[Antonio the Sixth]

FP of course

[courts]

Horrible policy.

1) Registering to vote isn't that hard.  If you can't be bothered with completing a simple form, how much time are you going to spend learning about candidates or issues?  Voting and registering should be as easy and simple as possible, but you should have to take some sort of proactive action in order to accomplish either task.

2) As voter registration databases are public record in most states, automatic voter registration essentially creates an index of every citizen, which raises privacy concerns.  If you want to be off the grid (and not vote), you should be able to.

unless you also support radically changing the way that social security and other programs/services work that's a pretty weird libertarian argument. especially coming from you, lol

[Indy Texas]

I think Texas may already do this. All I know is that I received a voter registration card in the mail when I turned 18. I never asked for it. I never had to fill out any forms. All I had to do was bring it with me when I went to go vote in November. And since then, I have received one in the mail every year.

If Texas is indeed doing this, do you know why the turnout there is one of the lowest in the country?

FP

Being registered to vote and actually doing it are different things. You get a card, but you don't get "reminders" in the mail to go vote, you don't get a photo ID which is what you actually NEED in order to vote here (you don't need the paper registration card at all and never have), you don't get transport/time off work to go vote...etc.

And again, I don't know what prompts them to send the cards. I don't know if it's being in the DPS database from having a driver's license. I don't know if there's some nefarious department at the Secretary of State's office that conspires to send cards to rich suburban Anglos and nobody else.

[dead0man]

Probably a dumb question but what are the many unnecessary bureaucratic barriers that block the ability of eligible persons to register to vote.  I don't recall there being any when I registered, but I'm white and not young or poor so perhaps my privilege helped me out and I just didn't notice.

[greenforest32]

I don't think it's so much many as it is a few big ones and they list examples in the linked article (it has more text than the parts I quoted) like the registration deadlines, the lack of automatic updates, and even the opt-in model itself.

The main argument is a matter of effectiveness; why settle for a registration rate of 75% when you can achieve 95%+ with a simpler system? Automatic voter registration would be cheaper, more accurate, more up-to-date when processing changes (name change, change of address, etc), it would be less error-prone on the input side, and all the time these organizations spend registering people to vote could be spent talking with voters about the issues.

It's a win all-around over the current system. Hopefully Oregon can pass it in 2015. Democrats would have to net one state senate seat this year and hold as many as possible in the state house. The one Republican in the state house who voted for the 2013 bill retired (the district is pretty much safe-R) and I don't think the new representative will support it. It's too bad so many safe-D states are timid on this issue.

[nolesfan2011]

The only sensible way to go.

As voter registration databases are public record in most states, automatic voter registration essentially creates an index of every citizen, which raises privacy concerns.  If you want to be off the grid (and not vote), you should be able to.

While I  can emphasise with this, it isn't really possible to be off the grid for an extended period of time in a modern society.

Great idea, I don't have a problem with it at all, and anyone who is a US Citizen at least has a social security number... which is already an index of people, so that's redundant to say it causes privacy concerns, just for being born you get assigned an SS number.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

I dunno, seems like there would be a lot of error in terms of people being automatically registered somewhere they haven't lived in a while, or just being missed altogether.  More important would be same-day registration.

[Franzl]

It's the type of thing that's just too simple and "common sense" to ever have a chance of being implemented in American elections.

[dead0man]

You would have a point if there really were many unnecessary bureaucratic barriers that block the ability of eligible persons to register to vote in the US.

[Franzl]

You would have a point if there really were many unnecessary bureaucratic barriers that block the ability of eligible persons to register to vote in the US.

I'd agree with you intuitively, but it seems there are quite a few issues in practice. Don't see why the process shouldn't be made as simple as possible.

[dead0man]

Are there though?  I asked twice what they were and all I got was:registration deadlines, the lack of automatic updates, and even the opt-in model itself.  None of that seems particularly heinous....or accurate for that matter.

[Tender Branson]

I'm a strong supporter of course and think it's common sense to have it (like we do here).

Obviously, the system that we have here (or in most other European countries, except the Anglo-countries), could not be established in the US for political reasons.

The system we have here is based on the CPR (Central Population Registry), which means every person who lives here is registered in the town he or she lives. You usually have to do this one time (unless you move to another city). When you are born, your parents will register you at your local town hall in the city you live. From this day on, you are already registered to vote as well, once you turn 16 (the voting age here).

The good thing with this is that all people who are eligible citizens will be able to vote on election day. There is no cut-off day either, like in personal voter registration systems. In most US states with personal voter registration, the cut-off date is 2 weeks ahead of an election. Which means that if there's a late "game-changing" election event that makes you want to vote, you can't because the deadline to register has already passed (unless you live in the few states with same-day registration).

As you can see, the automatic voter registration system is vastly superior to the personal registration system, because A) all people who are eligible are registered to vote B) there's no cutoff date.

Also remember the voter-registration fraud problems with "voter-registration"-groups such as ACORN or others ? Not the case with our systems, which are updated by the local town hall workers and the CPR database.

Nonetheless, a CPR-based system would never be possible in the US because A) politicians would be scared of "Big Brother"-stuff ("The evil government tracks where I live and where I move to.") and B) right-wing Tea-Party morons who think it's a duty to register yourself and it's not the government's job to do so.

[IceSpear]

It's the type of thing that's just too simple and "common sense" to ever have a chance of being implemented in American elections.

Like electing Jeff Sessions as president.

[TNF]

Voter registration is a bad idea to begin with. If you can make it to the polls and are above the age of majority, you should be allowed to vote. Just sign your name on a piece of paper afterward so they have a record of you voting. Done.

It worked fairly well for a century and a half in this country, so I'm not sure why it wouldn't work in the 21st Century. Voter registration was originally implemented by the 'progressives' to make it harder for immigrant whites (which they considered subhuman), blacks, and people who didn't speak English (a lot of people around the turn of the 20th Century, mind) to vote. Don't think it wasn't an intentional policy carried out to disenfranchise working class people shortly after many states enacted universal male suffrage, because it was. The franchise in America has always been one of the forefronts of the struggle between those who have everything and those who make everything.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

Voter registration is a bad idea to begin with. If you can make it to the polls and are above the age of majority, you should be allowed to vote. Just sign your name on a piece of paper afterward so they have a record of you voting. Done.

It worked fairly well for a century and a half in this country, so I'm not sure why it wouldn't work in the 21st Century. Voter registration was originally implemented by the 'progressives' to make it harder for immigrant whites (which they considered subhuman), blacks, and people who didn't speak English (a lot of people around the turn of the 20th Century, mind) to vote. Don't think it wasn't an intentional policy carried out to disenfranchise working class people shortly after many states enacted universal male suffrage, because it was. The franchise in America has always been one of the forefronts of the struggle between those who have everything and those who make everything.

The Progressive movement was not "shortly after" the 15th amendment.