[EL] Oregon SoS Demands that Postal Service Stop Delivering Ballots with Insufficient Postage?

[Dan Meek]

The Postal Service says it will worry about getting paid later.  It is 
not a lot of money. Current experience in Montana (apparently with 
multi-ounce ballots) is that mail-in ballots with insufficient postage 
are less than 1% of all ballots received (about 3/4 of 1%). Even that 
very high level would mean fewer than 15,000 such ballots statewide in 
Oregon. Probably many of those would be only one cent insufficient (with 
last year's 44-cent stamp). So the total cost statewide would almost 
certainly be less than $5,000 to accept all of these ballots and pay the 
Postal Service for them.

It is a mystery why the Oregon Secretary of State would demand that the 
Postal Service stop delivering these ballots.  To save maybe a grand 
total of $5,000 statewide in an election with about 2.1 million 
registered voters?

Some Oregon counties are nevertheless refusing to accept the postage-due 
ballots.  See 
http://www.oregonlive.com/mapes/index.ssf/2012/11/charges_fly_in_oregon_secretar.html. 
I assume that means that they give them back to the Postal Service, 
unopened.  The Postal Service then probably returns them to the senders, 
but it is way too late for the senders to mail them in again.  And in 
some Oregon counties the nearest drop site is over 50 miles away.

I would appreciate further comments on how this complies, or does not 
comply, with federal law and the U.S. Constitution.

Dan Meek

	503-293-9021 	dan at meek.net <mailto:dan at meek.net>	866-926-9646 fax




On 11/3/2012 3:51 PM, Scarberry, Mark wrote:

Aha! The letter from the Postmaster General that was attached to Doug's 
earlier post says that the postal service will deliver the ballots even 
if they don't have sufficient postage. It appears that the Postal 
Service will not insist that the clerks pay (or agree to pay) the 
postage that is due.

*From:*law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu 
[mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] *On Behalf Of 
*Scarberry, Mark
*Sent:* Saturday, November 03, 2012 3:36 PM
*To:* Doug Hess; Dan Meek
*Cc:* Election Law
*Subject:* Re: [EL] Oregon SoS Demands that Postal Service Stop 
Delivering Ballots with Insufficient Postage?

If a ballot envelope comes in postage due, then the clerk may need to 
pay the postage in order actually to receive the envelope from the 
postal worker. I haven't gotten anything postage due in quite a while, 
but I don't think you can just take the letter or package and then 
refuse to pay the postage due amount. It may not be a matter of the 
clerk refusing to receive the ballot but instead of the postal worker 
refusing to deliver it.

*From:*law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu 
<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> 
[mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] *On Behalf Of 
*Doug Hess
*Sent:* Saturday, November 03, 2012 3:22 PM
*To:* Dan Meek
*Cc:* Election Law
*Subject:* Re: [EL] Oregon SoS Demands that Postal Service Stop 
Delivering Ballots with Insufficient Postage?

"Not accepting" as in refusing to receive them, however that is done, or 
as in destroying or tossing them? Or "not accepting" to mean they accept 
them but plan to not count them?


Douglas R. Hess, PhD

On Sat, Nov 3, 2012 at 5:59 PM, Dan Meek <dan at meek.net 
<mailto:dan at meek.net>> wrote:

We know that some county clerks are currently not accepting the ballots 
postage due.

Dan Meek

	

503-293-9021 <tel:503-293-9021>

	

dan at meek.net <mailto:dan at meek.net>

	

866-926-9646 <tel:866-926-9646> fax

On 11/3/2012 12:50 PM, Doug Hess wrote:

In the letter on this issue the Post Master General (should we call him 
General, too?) points out that the state doesn't have to accept or count 
ballots arriving without sufficient postage (see second to last 
paragraph in letter in link below).

Not sure why he felt that was an area he needs to opine on! But it does 
raise the possibility that some county clerks, or whomever, won't count 
these ballots, now that they know that the USP will keep delivering 
them. Anybody sense a county might do that?

Where's Paul Gronke when you need him?

http://indparty.com/postmaster.pdf


Douglas R. Hess, PhD
Washington, DC
ph. 202-277-6400 <tel:202-277-6400>
douglasrhess at gmail.com <mailto:douglasrhess at gmail.com>

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