Uncommon Knowledge
2000–2001 #531:
Exorcizing the Vote
What did the election fiasco of 2000 tell us about the need for voting reform? Is the
American voting system, as many suggest, antiquated and in need of a complete
overhaul? Are national voting standards needed, and if so, does the federal government
even have the authority to implement them? Guests: David W. Brady, Senior Fellow,
Hoover Institution; Bowen H. and Janice Arthur McCoy Professor of Political Science
and Ethics in the Stanford Graduate School of Business; Professor of Political Science in
the School of Humanities and Sciences, Stanford University. Pamela S. Karlan, Kenneth
and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest, Stanford University.
Funding for this program is provided by
John M. Olin Foundation and Starr Foundation.
Peter Robinson: Welcome to Uncommon Knowledge. I'm Peter Robinson. Our show
today, Voting Reform. The year is 1900, one century and one year ago. The presidential
candidates William Jennings Bryan and William McKinley. As you try to decide whom
to vote for, you get your information about the candidates by way of newspapers and you
talk politics with your friends over a telephone that looks like this. On election day when
you actually vote, you do so using a mechanical level machine that looks like this.
Now let's go forward a little more than half a century, the year is 1964. The presidential
candidates are Barry Goldwater and Lyndon Johnson. You get your information about the
candidates over the television and you talk politics with your friends over a telephone that
looks like this. On election day when you cast your ballot, you do so using a punch card
ballot like this.
We come now to 2000, last year. The presidential candidates are Al Gore and George W.
Bush. If you were like millions of Americans, you got information about the candidates
over the internet and you talked politics with your friends over a telephone that looked
like this. But, on election day when you cast your ballot, you did so using a mechanical
lever machine circa 1900 or a punch card ballot circa the 1960's.
So the question on our show is this, is the American system of voting outdated and, as
many suggest, particularly after the thirty-seven days that it took to straighten out the
vote in Florida, in need of reform?
With us, two guests. Pam Karlan is a Professor of Law at Stanford University and David
Brady is a Political Scientist and Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution.
Title: Exorcizing the Vote
Peter Robinson: The New York Times, I quote, "The balloting breakdowns in
November demonstrated that a complete overhaul is needed of--in the way Americans
vote," closed quote. Commentator Andrew Sullivan, again I quote, "I'm waiting for
Democratic Party Chairman, Terry McAliff to start protests over this week's Israeli
election." Sullivan wrote this in February. "Some 78,385 votes were deemed invalid. The
invalid votes comprised three percent of the voters. That invalid rate is only a might
lower than Florida's. Suspicious huh?" So we have, on the one hand, the ponderous
sincerity of the New York Times saying we need a vast national of--of the way we vote.
And on the other hand, the spitely sarcasm of Andrew Sullivan saying, relax, mistakes
get made in democracies. Which best fits your own view of the matter? David?
David Brady: Well I certainly would like to see people's votes in the United States count
and that the system be fair along those lines so that we know who won.
Peter Robinson: Whole country needs to reform its--the way votes are cast…
[Talking at same time]
David Brady: Is this a nominative or positive question? What do I think will happen?
Peter Robinson: What do you think--no, what do you think should happen?
David Brady: I think they should reform the electoral system.
Peter Robinson: Pam, New York Times or Andrew Sullivan?
Pam Karlan: Boy, that's the devil's choice almost as bad as who we get to choose for
president.
Peter Robinson: She's starting already, David.
Pam Karlan: I think we need electoral reformance, not clear to me what we need is a
uniform system for casting ballots but I think we do need a lot of reform.
Peter Robinson: New York Times both of you. Okay. What went wrong in Florida? Let's
just tick down the list of the alleged mistakes, screw-ups, etc. in Florida? Racial
intimidation. On the one hand, you've got Jesse Jackson and others claiming that black
voters were pressured or intimidated to stay away from the polls. On the other hand, it
turns out that the blacks' share of the total vote cast in Florida was bigger than the blacks'
share of the Florida population. Racial intimidation actually a problem in Florida?
Pam Karlan: It's been a problem in the past and there were voters who showed up and
were told that they'd been disenfranchised for convictions of felonies who'd never been
accused of a crime at all. That tended to happen more in majority black precincts than
white precincts. So…
Peter Robinson: And that evidence is in. That's not anecdotal now or is…
Pam Karlan: That's--those are allegations in a complaint that's been filed in court so the
lawyers are making the representation that their clients are telling them to…
Peter Robinson: Persuasively to you though?
Pam Karlan: Yes.
Peter Robinson: There was some of that going on?
Pam Karlan: There was some of it.
Peter Robinson: David?
David Brady: Did some of it go on? Yeah. How much? I don't know.
Peter Robinson: Do you tend to think it was insignificant or do you tend to think that it
was significant? You just don't know.
David Brady: Insignificant.
Peter Robinson: Insignificant? Okay. Voter fraud. Miami Herald found after review of
one-third of Florida counties that twelve hundred votes were cast illegally by felons. In
Duval County alone, four hundred--alone, four hundred and ninety-nine votes were cast
by unregistered voters. In several precincts, at least two, the number of votes cast
outnumbered the number of registered voters. Fraud a significant problem or just
statistical anomaly, David?
David Brady: It--the--the facts are that what distinguishes republicans from democrats
on this issue is the republicans say they want the ballot--they want the voter registration
roles cleaned up so this doesn't happen. Now the question is, are the voter registration
roles in that shape because they want them to be in that shape, because if they're messed
up, it's easier to have fraud or is it the fact that we don't spend very much money on
elections. I think it's, in most places, it is a question of we haven't spent much money on
elections and therefore, we don't have a system to clean the fr--roles up.
Peter Robinson: Pam?
Pam Karlan: Well you want clean roles but there's a kind of tension here. The more you
make sure that only people who are absolutely qualified to vote vote, the more likely you
are to make mistakes and end up with some people who are qualified to vote getting
knocked off the roles as well.
Peter Robinson: Is it a problem in Florida…
Pam Karlan: That's what happened in Florida.
Peter Robinson: …or is it--that is a problem…
Pam Karlan: That's, in part, what happened in Florida is they tried to clean the roles to
get rid of felons. They didn't get rid of all the felons but they got rid of a number of
people who aren't felons.
Peter Robinson: Punch card voting. Serious problem? The actual system by which votes
were cast in Florida?
David Brady: I think--I think punch card votes are probably the most inaccurate.
Pam Karlan: Yeah, you know the only thing that still uses punch cards probably in the
entire country are--are archival research by historians looking at old computer punch
cards and the way we conduct elections. Nobody else uses punch cards for anything.
Peter Robinson: Systematic bias in Florida? Punch cards in poorer districts?
Pam Karlan: Well it actually turns out it's not so much that they're poor districts as they
are more populous districts which went to a machine voting earlier. So they adopted
systems when the systems were st--still kind of kludgy and didn't work very well.
Suburbs tend to be richer, tend to be whiter. They adopted systems later. The systems had
already improved and they worked better. So it's kind of leapfrogging.
Peter Robinson: Let's see what our guests make of my opinion about the election in
Florida.
Title: My Damn Butterfly
Peter Robinson: In any large democracy, you're going to have a certain amount of petty
fraud, outright incompetence, a certain number of confused voters and what really went
wrong in Florida was an exceptionally close election coupled with an unusually
combative and sore loser. And since those…
Pam Karlan: Who's the sore loser?
Peter Robinson: …the sore loser is Al Gore. In the end…
Pam Karlan: In the end, he was the loser but…
Peter Robinson: Oh no, no, no. No, no, no. If you look at the way--the--the Miami
Herald and other media that are doing the recounts, on almost any set of rules that you
could construct, Gore would not have picked up enough votes to overturn the results. So
the point…
Pam Karlan: I'm not sure about that.
Peter Robinson: …let me make my point. Let me make--well that's certainly the strong
tendency so far in all the media recounting. Let me make my point. My point is that this
set of circumstances is extremely unlikely to recur for another century or so. We can tie
ourselves in knots, spend huge amounts of money trying to squeeze that one or two
percent of confusion out of the system and really get nowhere. So we should just relax.
Can I get either one of you to buy that argument? David?
David Brady: Not entirely, no because the facts are that when people are--voting is more
than the way you just portrayed it. It's a commitment on the part of people to come and
vote and have some say in who their representatives are. And, of course, it's only in close
elections that that matters in some sense because most of the time, the elections and
there's going to be no question. So it is precisely at the time of close elections that people
ought to feel that's when their vote counts most and they ought to feel that it gets counted
accurately. And that's important.
Peter Robinson: Okay.
Pam Karlan: Well and the other thing is it's not just presidential elections where these
machines cause these errors and screw up the votes. I, you know, how likely is it that the
next presidential election will have a problem like this? Not so likely. How likely is it at-that somewhere in the country a mayoral election will be screwed up in this way or a
state senate election or congressional election in the next ten years? Very likely.
Peter Robinson: Close elections at that level happen somewhere all the time?
Pam Karlan: All the time.
Peter Robinson: Okay.
Pam Karlan: All the time.
Peter Robinson: All right let's go through the reforms now. We have to begin with the
big one first. Can I interest either one of you in reforming or getting rid of the electoral
college?
Pam Karlan: No.
Peter Robinson: We have a candidate who lost the popular vote by almost six hundred
thousand and yet is the President of the United States, the fourth time in our history that
that's happened. You don't want to get rid of it, how come?
Pam Karlan: I--I'm not sure what the advantage of getting rid of it is. I think it will
render elections closer in some odd ways. If you think about the…
Peter Robinson: Why's that?
Pam Karlan: Well because you're going to have to have recounts all over the country if
the margin is close. You're not going to just have recounts in some states and you can
pick up those votes anywhere. If you think about what would have happened if George
Bush was losing across the country by a fraction of one percent of the vote, all he had to
do was go into each precinct and pick up seven more votes in that precinct. He would be
the winner. With the stakes that high, you could end up with recounts lasting forever. It's
just not clear to me that it--that the real problem here is that the popular vote doesn't
match the electoral vote. That happens very infrequently. And when it happens, it may be
a sign that there are some regional issues as well as kind of popular vote issues that are
better--better handled…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: You are quite content, the electoral college sits easily with you?
Pam Karlan: It sits easily with me. And more to the point, there is no way we're ever
going to get rid of the electoral college.
Peter Robinson: Okay. David?
David Brady: Uh…
Peter Robinson: You like it or you--you--or are we just stuck with it?
David Brady: Doesn't matter whether I like it. It's not going to change. They're--there
were two proposals in the fifties that tried to change things. It's not going to happen. The
way they were defeated was the big states like it because…
Peter Robinson: Big states like the electoral college?
David Brady: …the big states like the electoral college because people come out and
you can win California by two votes. You get all the electoral votes of it so they love it
because candidates spend more time in those states.
Peter Robinson: Right.
David Brady: And secondly, the small states like it because states like Wyoming and
Delaware are under-represented otherwise. This way they get over-represented…
Peter Robinson: Before we get to specific electoral reforms, let's try to lay down a
couple of general but important principles.
Title: The Mind's Aye
Peter Robinson: How smart do voters have to be? Here we are in a democracy
permitting voters, sort of premised on the notion that voters are clever enough to sort out
bond issues, whom they want on a school board, right up to that solemn decision about
who should be the next president of the United States. And yet, in Florida, it--the premise
on certain--from certain quarters was that these poor voters are so easily confused that the
butterfly ballot throws them off. So the question is, how do you satisfy--how do you
resolve this tension?
Pam Karlan: Well we may…
Peter Robinson: You want to design a voting system that's almost anybody with no
education at all could use?
Pam Karlan: That's right. We made a decision, congress made a decision and the
supreme court upheld it in 1970 that literacy tests were banned nationwide. You don't
have to be literate to be entitled to vote.
Peter Robinson: You do have to be literate to read the ballot though, don't you?
Pam Karlan: No, you're entitled to the assistance of someone to help you read the ballot
if you can't read it.
Peter Robinson: Okay.
Pam Karlan: So we've abolished the idea that literacy is a qualification for voting.
Having done that, we should have a commitment to making sure that voters with the level
of literacy that large numbers of Americans who've come through our public schools
have, can actually cast a ballot and have that ballot counted.
Peter Robinson: Okay. So you place the responsibilities on the government to design
voting systems that are extremely easy to use. That's…
Pam Karlan: If we want everybody's vote to count, yes.
Peter Robinson: You go for that?
David Brady: I think that's--well if you--if you--it's the law of the land and so it doesn't
matter what I believe.
Peter Robinson: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay it's the law--but you both said it's the law of the
land. You could tell by--from Pam's enthusiasm in citing the 1970 decision that she
personally favors it. My question is…
[Talking at same time]
David Brady: I'm a little less in favor. I have a brother who's a Downs Syndrome and he
voted in the last election. I--I don't see how he could vote but he did. So he was assisted
etc., etc. So the que--so the question is, should he have voted? Probably not, I think but I
don't know how you draw the line.
Peter Robinson: Okay.
David Brady: I don't know where you draw the line.
Peter Robinson: Without being brutal?
David Brady: Well without going back to a system in which you systematically allow
local registrars to keep black people from voting on the grounds that they couldn't read or
weren't literate or couldn't ask questions. They'd ask ki--that--that's just a long history. So
once you have a history of that, it--the seventy case has to be seen in that light and if
that's the light, then the question is, you're going to draw the line. Now do I believe, in
some sense, that any American election was decided by Down's Syndrome voters? No I
don't. I just don't believe…
Peter Robinson: Next topic, the principle of federalism.
Title: I'm Not Sure My Constitution Can Handle This
Peter Robinson: Voting systems is one place where federalism shows up in a very robust
form in the United States of America in the year 2000 and 2001. States are in charge of
choosing which voting systems they want. And, in fact, in many states it's left up to
individual counties or voting units, precincts, whatever they're called, to decide for
themselves what kind of voting systems they'll use which is why in Florida, you had
some using punch card, others using optical scanners and so on and so on and so forth. So
the question then is, how do you establish national standards or in--or engage in a
national reform without violating this very robust instance of federalism? David?
David Brady: Well I don't want to do it. I'm--I'm very Tophelian on that where it's
probably a good thing to have local people messing around trying to get the system to
work. It's useful for small d democracy. So I don't--first of all, I don't think it's going to
happen at the federal level. This whole voting reform thing's going to be county by
county, state by state…
Peter Robinson: Hang on. Senator Sam Brownback and Charles Schumer, as of the
taping of this show, have proposed spending 2.5 billion for equipment upgrades in the
form of matching grants…
David Brady: Well that's good…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: That's okay with you.
David Brady: No, what are you talking about. I'll give you eight hundred million bills in
the congress where two guys proposed spending a bunch of money on stuff that's not
going to happen. That's one of them.
Peter Robinson: Okay. So…
David Brady: That bill's not going to pass.
Peter Robinson: Okay so don't worry about it because it's not going to pass. But, in
principle, you'd oppose the federal government dangling carrots for large sums of money
for matching grant. Just leave it to the localities that created the mess in the first place.
David Brady: Okay look, I'm--I'm, first of all, I'm now saying this as a political scientist.
My analysis of the situation is the following: that those bills are not going to pass because
it's partisan in the congress. The republicans on the one hand, want to say we want to
clean up these voter registration lists. The democrats want to do what they're going to do.
They're going to talk a lot of smack and nothing's going to happen.
Peter Robinson: Okay. Qu--question of federalism. How do you--how do you engage in
a reform, a national reform, without violating these principles of federalism?
Pam Karlan: Well if you wanted to engage in nationwide reform, the easiest way to do it
is to use Article I, Section IV of the constitution, the so-called exceptions clause to the
elections clause. What that clause says is that the time, place and manner of electing
House of Representatives and senate members shall be left to the states but that congress
may, at any time, alter or amend those regulations. And what the supreme court has said
since the 1930's is congress has absolutely plenary power, that is complete power…
Peter Robinson: Okay.
Pam Karlan: …to regulate house and senate elections. And where house and senate
elections go, everything else will follow…
Peter Robinson: Right.
Pam Karlan: …because it's too expensive for a state that's holding an election for the
house or the senate on a particular…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: …to run two separate systems.
Peter Robinson: Okay. So…
Pam Karlan: So if congress wanted to do it, that's how they'd do it. Do they want to?
Peter Robinson: Should--should congress want to do it?
Pam Karlan: I don't think they should want to have a single election system nationwide
and the reason for that is one of the reasons why we have federalism is circumstances
differ from place to place. In some places where you have large numbers of voters voting,
you might want to have touch screens. In some places where you have small numbers of
voters voting, paper ballots are the best way to go. Paper ballots are simple. They're easy
to count the first time. They're easy to count the second time.
Peter Robinson: So you're willing to leave it to the localities even though in the history
we were referring to not long ago, the localities in the Jim Crowe period of the south…
Pam Karlan: Here's the thing…
Peter Robinson: …would--decided to--to--to ele--to come up with rules…
Pam Karlan: I don't think we should leave it…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: …that prevented black people from voting at all.
Pam Karlan: I don't think we should leave it to the localities altogether. What I think…
Peter Robinson: So how do you square this circle around?
Pam Karlan: I think the way to do it is not to prescribe particular election methods but
to prescribe standards that states have to meet. In other words, whatever election
standard--whatever election technology you want to use is fine but you can't have a
spoilage rate of more than three percent of the ballots or one percent of the ballots or .8
percent of the ballots. And you let the states decide what's the best way of getting there. I
mean…
Peter Robinson: And establish--so congress would establish some sort of auditing…
Pam Karlan: Congress would establish a nationwide standard that says, you cannot use a
system unless that system has been certified by an election authority to be this accurate.
Peter Robinson: Clean solution. You go for that?
Pam Karlan: We do that all the time with things like the Clean Air Act. We could do it
here.
Peter Robinson: Would you go for that?
David Brady: Yeah, (?) on the standard. I--I think that's a--that's a reasonable way to
think about it--and one--because one of the things there you could do is you could deal
with ballot reform. A lot of the trouble what happens is is because these unbelievable
ballots. I frankly have a Ph.D. and I walk away from voting here in California often
thinking about, did I--and where we have punch cards. You put it on--did I actually vote
for--and then you got a book in this hand…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: You always have to check the book against the numbers because you…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: …ballot you can't tell what you voted for. You have to check…
[Talking at same time]
David Brady: I have often walked out of the booth thinking, wonder if I voted for that
proposition or not.
Pam Karlan: Yeah, or that fluoridation of the water, that Communist plot.
[Talking at same time]
David Brady: I mean, seriously. So…
Peter Robinson: Let's move to the specific reforms that our guests would like to see.
Title: Keep It Simple, Stupid
Peter Robinson: According to the Federal Election Commission in the presidential
election of 1996, not the last one but the one before but that was the last one for which I
could get statistics. Thirty-seven per--percent of votes were cast using punch card ballots,
twenty-five percent using optical scan systems, twenty-one percent using mechanical
lever machines, eight percent using computerized screens, higher percentage than I would
have guessed, and two percent using paper ballots. All right, we have this welter of
different voting systems. David, you are now elections Czar. What system, what voting
system would you set in place right here in California, for example?
David Brady: I wouldn't hav--I wouldn't have one. If--for California, I'd shorten the
ballot and…
Peter Robinson: How do you shorten the ballot? You'd shorten the wording or…
David Brady: Well I'd say you drop off, you don't have so many prop--you don't have so
many referendum. I fr--frankly…
Peter Robinson: Ballot initiatives?
David Brady: I'd get rid of the ballot initiatives. I'd hate--taking it--personally a great
deal of pleasure in going in and voting for or against some of those things but they're out
of hand. It just switches the elite. I just don't think it is a very useful thing. So I'd get rid
of that. That'd save a lot of time right there.
Peter Robinson: Okay now, can we…
David Brady: I'd get away from punch--I--I don't like punch machines. I think they're
very hard to understand so I'd get away from punch machines. And I'd either have a paper
ballot or a ballot scanning thing if I'm Czar and can do whatever I want.
Peter Robinson: Okay.
David Brady: I'd set out a number of things and say, here's the money available. We
prefer these but, you know, if some county or precinct said, we want to do this, you let it
go.
Peter Robinson: The only thing that you've really be--been--managed to do so far, the
two of you, at the national level, is establish a national spoilage rate. Everybody has to hit
one percent or .8 percent.
David Brady: It's because we're reasonable people. We understand that politics is
intricate.
Peter Robinson: Well all I'm telling you is that this river of reform with which we
started the show is disappearing into the sand as the show progresses.
David Brady: What river? You started with the river. There's no river out there.
Peter Robinson: You both agreed with the New York Times. I read you this New York
Times…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: The election system now…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: A complete overhaul is needed in the…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: No, we didn't say a complete overhaul. As between that and--and thinking
about what happened in Israel, I would go with the New York Times rather than Andrew
Sullivan but…
Peter Robinson: Okay.
Pam Karlan: …that's--that's a different entirely than saying we need to do massive kinds
of reforms. I actually think we ought to do more to make sure it's easy for people to vote.
Peter Robinson: Easy for people to vote, what do you mean? You mean, get them to the
voting…
Pam Karlan: I mean--I mean…
Peter Robinson: …place?
Pam Karlan: …that we should make it easier for people to cast absentee ballots. In
many states, that's still very hard to do. We ought to have polls that are…
Peter Robinson: And absentee ballots is the highest voter fraud.
Pam Karlan: They're also one of the best ways of allowing people who find it difficult
or impossible to get to the polls to vote. That was the point I was making earlier. There's
a little bit of a trade-off. We could guarantee that every single American who votes is
absolutely qualified to vote but if we do that, there will be a whole lot of Americans who
are qualified who are going to be wrongfully cut from the…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: You're now election Czar. You make absentee ballots…
Pam Karlan: I'd make absentee ballots easier for people to…
Peter Robinson: Easier.
Pam Karlan: …cast.
Peter Robinson: By the way, what reason would there then be for anybody to go to the
actual voting place? Here in California, you can fill out som--mail it in, they send you a
ballot, you don't have to show up on election day. And about…
Pam Karlan: That's right.
Peter Robinson: … a third of the votes here in California are cast absentee. Why--why
have voting places at all? Should everything be done absentee ballot?
Pam Karlan: No. I actually don't think everything should be done absentee ballot
because I actually think there's a--a personal value myself to going and casting a vote. I
think it has…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: …a kind of important kind of civic…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: Yeah, I think it has a kind of important civic responsibility but not
everybody can do that…
Peter Robinson: Okay.
Pam Karlan: And as between saying, if you can't do that, you don't get--your vote
doesn't count at all or saying, you can cast an absentee ballot and make absentee ballots
easier. I would have uniform opening and closing times across the country so that
everybody…
Peter Robinson: Okay. But you're--now you're up to two--that violates federalism…
Pam Karlan: No, that doesn't violate…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: In any--in any election which there's a congressional candidate on the
ballot, the polls shall open at, you know, seven a.m…
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: …Greenwich mean time.
[Talking at same time]
Pam Karlan: No, I'd actually have a rolling time across the country so that the polls
don't close anywhere in the country while there are still voters voting.
Peter Robinson: So you establish national hours.
Pam Karlan: National hours.
Peter Robinson: You establish a national spoilage rate.
Pam Karlan: National spoilage rate.
Peter Robinson: What else nationally?
Pam Karlan: Make absentee voter--voting to do. Require…
Peter Robinson: Would you do that at the national level? You want congress to pass that
law about absentee ballots?
Pam Karlan: No, I actually think that should be done at the state level.
Peter Robinson: That should be done at the state level.
Pam Karlan: That should be done at the state level because different states have
different ways of handling their absentees but there's something wrong with a system
where, for example, it's so easy to cast an absentee ballot in California and it's so hard to
do one in Alabama. In Alabama, you want to cast an absentee ballot, you have to have
two people notarize your application for an absentee ballot.
Peter Robinson: Right.
Pam Karlan: That makes it all harder for people…
Peter Robinson: Well Al--Alabama just places a higher value on the sacramental aspect
of going to the voting place.
Pam Karlan: No, Alabama places a lower value on making sure rural, black voters can
actually cast their ballots.
Peter Robinson: Okay.
Pam Karlan: It's no accident that the places that have the most restrictive absentee
voting laws are often the places that have often, you know…
Peter Robinson: So you're in favor of letting the localities handle all this except in the
south.
Pam Karlan: Well I think in a lot of those places it violates the Voting Rights Act and I
think people should bring lawsuits under the Voting Rights Act saying that this has a
disparate impact on the ability of black voters to vote. So I think we should make it
easier…
Peter Robinson: Time to end the show with some predictions.
Title: Chads and Balances
Peter Robinson: By 2004, the next presidential election, will we have a national
standard for spoilage rate? Will congress enact that?
Pam Karlan: No.
Peter Robinson: You don't think so. David?
David Brady: She's right.
Peter Robinson: Not a chance. Will we have a national set of time zones for vote--for
election day? Will congress enact that by 2004?
Pam Karlan: Maybe but I think probably not.
Peter Robinson: David?
David Brady: She's two for two.
Peter Robinson: Okay. This is all looking pretty grim.
David Brady: Can I ask about internet voting which is…
Peter Robinson: Go right ahead.
[Talking at same time]
David Brady: …question that all of your people…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: Go right ahead. Go ahead.
David Brady: …all eight people want to know…
Peter Robinson: Go ahead. Go ahead.
David Brady: No, I'm not going to be--the internet--the National Science Foundation
panel on internet voting is out and, in my opinion, they're exactly right. The call--the pri-the--the danger of--the--the--modern computer…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: Software companies…
David Brady: …the computers--your PC at home, the platform is so easily violated in
terms of stopping voting, in terms of miscounting, that it's not going to be possible until-not much of that till 2008.
Peter Robinson: Describe the scene four years hence when people vote…
Pam Karlan: There will be a lot more people voting on touch screen machines. There
will be a lot fewer people voting on punch card machines than we had in the last election.
David Brady: Which election?
Peter Robinson: Presidential election.
David Brady: Well that's right, on the presidential. My--my guess is that on--the--the
way internet voting can help out is a lot of elections are the cost of information is quite
high. So if you look at school board elections, the turnout is quite low. And so the
internet in--the internet voting in local elections can greatly reduce the cost of
information. And so, in that case, I do expect there to be a bunch of experiments at the
local level. There were some four in California this time but I expect there to be all kinds
of experiments across the United states where we're trying to solve that platform
problem.
Peter Robinson: Last question…
David Brady: …where people are voting that way.
Peter Robinson: …will the states that most need reform, you've mentioned Alabama,
that is to say, is there kind of negative self selection? The states that most need reform are
least likely to enact it? Is that a fair statement or not? Pam?
Pam Karlan: I think that's probably true in the sense that there are some states that just
have been much more organized and progressive and--and technologically adept in their
election systems. Now one of the things I'm working on now with a large kind of
consortium of groups is National Association of Secretaries of State and the National
Association of Chief Off--Election Officers and the like, are trying to get together and
really share much more information on what practices work and what practices don't. So I
think there will be a lot of kind of grass roots level, state and local level reform. I don't
think we're going to see it coming from congress and I don't think it's going to result in a
uniform system nationwide.
Peter Robinson: You buy that, David?
David Brady: I agree with that. I think that's a good sign it's going to come from the
local areas and I also agree there's going to be far less punch card voting and even in
states like Alabama, there will be less of it. There will--the changes will come. They'll
come more slowly at some places but there will be big changes between now and 2004
along the lines that she said.
Peter Robinson: David Brady, Pam Karlan, thank you very much.
Pam Karlan: Thank you.
David Brady: Thank you.
Peter Robinson: You just saw, our guests don't expect any dramatic national reform but
they do expect a number of states to move, if slowly, toward updating their voting
systems.
Hello. It's William Jennings Bryan. He wants a recount.
I'm Peter Robinson. Thanks for joining us.