Elections / Voting

As per the Okie Blogger Bash Consortium's weekly item topic, here's some ruminations on voting and elections:

I've served as either a poll watcher or an election judge a couple of times in Tchula, Mississippi. This was about 20 years after the 1965 Voting Rights Act, so the memories of being disenfranchised still clung heavily to the memories of the older voters of African descent. They would line-up in droves. Voting as a responsibility was something which they impressed upon me.

Mississippi is much more of a two-party state these days than it was in the 80s. Some Republicans were in office in the state, but for the most part, the Democrats ruled the roost. The state had the phenomenon of voting Republican for national offices, but Democrat for local positions. Part of this was facilitated by an open-primary system. One did not have to register as a "D" or an "R"; you just showed-up and voted. Most conservatives would vote in the Democratic primary, and then vote Republican in November. If you won the Democratic primary, odds were you were a shoe-in for the office in November. But the state still had to maintain the facade that it was a two-party state.

At the time I was a Republican (I now am registered as an Independent here in Oklahoma -- my sympathies lie with the Constitution Party, but there is no ballot access for the CP here -- a long story). I was asked to be the judge for Tchula's box for the Republican primary one year; the pay for the all-day job would be $40. I would be joined by two poll workers. We would be located at the same polling station as the Democratic primary box. I agreed to the honor of working the primary.

When the box opened, I had the other two workers observe my voting, and then settled-in for the trickle of those who were of GOP inclination to note their preference. Not so. The day stretched on and on. I had exhausted the paperback I brought to read. My two workers walked across the room to cast their ballots in the Democratic primary. At 7 PM the polls closed, and the three of us assembled to count the ballot, certify the result, and prepare the materials for forwarding to the county election official in charge of such matters. Mississippi requires a public announcement by the election judge outside the polling station of the results of each race. I had to stand-outside and announce the results: candidate so-and-so for such-and-such position, 1 vote. And so forth.

It cost the taxpayers of Mississippi $120 (1 judge and 2 workers) plus the cost of the ballots (250 or so, I think), for me to cast my ballot.