[EL] deaths after voting by mail

[Adam Morse]

The statistics to make some educated guesses are pretty easily available.
 In 2009, the U.S. death rate was 793.8 deaths per hundred thousand per
year.  So that means that in 30 days the death rate will be roughly one
twelfth of that, so about 66 deaths per hundred thousand.  Those won't be
evenly distributed across different districts, because demographics differ,
but it still gives us a rough guideline--maybe in a particularly elderly
district, it might be 100 or 150 deaths per hundred thousand, although
that's just pure guesswork on my part.  And of course, even if absentee
ballots are permitted 30 days in advance, not everyone will fill them out
immediately, so it might be more accurate to assume people fill them out 15
days in advance.  The net conclusion is that there might be .05 or .1% of
the vote affected--perhaps as little as .01%, perhaps as much as .2%.  But
of course, that's the gross number of votes affected--the net votes
affected would be much lower, because some of the deceased would have cast
votes for each of the two competing candidates.  So the net effect might be
10 or 20% of the gross effect.  So, in districts where an election is
exceedingly close--well within the "margin of litigation", at a point where
miscounted votes probably substantially outnumber the margin between the
candidates--it might very rarely matter whether the votes of deceased
voters are counted.  Note also that this assumes that all of the deceased
voters would have cast absentee ballots, as in a completely vote by mail
jurisdiction.

Net conclusion:  hardly worth worrying about either way.  Once in a blue
moon it will come up, in the same way that very rarely absolute ties come
up in local elections.

--Adam Morse

On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 11:53 AM, Doug Hess <douglasrhess at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> Let's say you vote by mail and then kick the bucket before ballots are
> counted or before election day. Assuming election officials notice this
> about you and spot your ballot, do laws or regulations address counting
> that ballot? I assume that if you were eligible to vote when you did, that
> dieing before ballots are counted doesn't matter.
>
> If an election is entirely by mail and you can get ballots 30 days in
> advance (is that standard?), just how many adults go six feet under in that
> period. I'm wondering--for Friday amusement partially--if the number or
> percentage is enough that the dead can determine an outcome?
>
> Doug
>
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