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| | Issue #21.35 :: 08/27/2008 - 09/02/2008 | Myths and Realities of Registering, Voting
| BY ERIC K. WARD
| Myth: Registering to vote is a bothersome, inconvenient task that takes up too much time in a day.
Reality: Registering to vote is easy breezy; can be done at any county elections or state motor vehicles office, or through the mail by downloading a form from the S.C. Election Commission (state.sc.us/scsec/vr.html); and takes only a matter of minutes, probably less time than filling out a credit card application at any chain department store.
Myth: One vote never makes a difference, and in general balloting can be left to others because elections are never close enough for a few votes more to matter.
Reality: Sometimes one vote does turn fate; likewise if a relatively small number of additional people engage in the most democratic of processes.
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| Yo quiero Taco Bell! The Mexican fast food chain is doing its part to increase voter participation by posting signs, such as these at its Broad River Road location in Columbia, encouraging people to register and providing forms to do so. Photo by Jonathan Sharpe |
Witness the June primary for the Florence mayor’s post, in which challenger Stephen Wukela defeated incumbent Frank Willis by — you guessed it — one single, solitary vote.
And consider the 2006 S.C. superintendent of education contest, wherein Jim Rex bested Karen Floyd by 455 votes out of more than 1 million cast. That’s four ten-thousands of 1 percent (.0004) and the number of write-ins exceeded the margin of victory.
Myth: Politicians want more people to vote and are always trying to make it easier to do so.
Reality: Some elected officials are self-serving and try to make it harder to vote because lower turnout often favors incumbents.
Think about proposed laws in this year’s legislative session that ended in June, one of which would have required people to present a passport or birth certificate to register to vote.
Myth: The United States, what with being the beacon of democracy in the world, is a leading nation in voter turnout.
Reality: This country’s voter participation sucks worse than embarrassingly, ranking 139th, just ahead of Tanzania, according to the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance.
Why so bad?
“There’s no individual factor,” says USC political science professor Robert Oldendick, an expert on elections and polling and director of the university’s Institute for Public Service and Policy Research.
For example, Oldendick says, “In some of those countries that are ranked ahead of the United States, [voter] participation is almost mandated.”
South Carolina isn’t exactly a bastion of civic engagement either. The state came in 43rd in voter turnout in the 2004 elections, says the nonprofit nonpartisan Democracy North Carolina.
Amid these myths and realities, the Nov. 4 elections approach with implications huge and small, from control of the White House to the makeup of Richland County Council.
The deadline to register to vote in the elections is Oct. 4.
Meanwhile, against the efforts of some power-hungry pols, other forces are trying to increase voter participation.
The South Carolina Progressive Network, an umbrella of 63 organizations dedicated to various causes, says it has registered about 6,500 people since launching its Missing Voter Project in 2004.
The larger goal of the project is to organize people around issues important to them in order to build a social justice movement with the strength “to make politicians listen to us,” says Brett Bursey, director of the Progressive Network.
Nationally, Taco Bell is doing its part by posting signs at its Mexican fast food joints encouraging people to register and providing forms to do so.
Who says capitalism undermines democratic values? | |
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