[EL] College Student Voter Suppression

Thu Jun 19 05:00:41 PDT 2014

Yeah but these Democrats are very creative.  Jim Bopp

In a message dated 6/18/2014 9:48:42 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
sean at impactpolicymanagement.com writes:

I think if this qualifies as  ‘vote suppression’ then the term has been 
stretched so far as to be devoid of  any real meaning. 

Sean  Parnell 
President 
Impact Policy Management,  LLC 
6411 Caleb  Court 
Alexandria, VA   22315 
571-289-1374  (c) 
sean at impactpolicymanagement.com

From:  law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu  
[mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of  J.H. Snider
Sent: Wednesday, June 18, 2014 9:34 PM
To:  law-election at department-lists.uci.edu
Subject: [EL] College Student  Voter Suppression

My son, a  rising sophomore at Yale College who is attending an intensive 
foreign  language summer program out-of-state, recently called home with a 
most  surprising problem.  Excited that at age 19 he is finally able to vote,  
he had diligently signed up with the Maryland Board of Elections to vote by 
 absentee ballot for Maryland’s statewide June 24 primary.  Since,  
according to my son, the Maryland Board of Elections no longer mails physical  
ballots, he received an electronic ballot which he was instructed to print  out, 
fill out, place in an envelope, address, and mail back.  Sounds  simple 
enough, right?  Well, it turns out my son, like many people his  age, had 
rarely mailed an envelope before—a skill most people of older  generations master 
in the third grade.  He not only wasn’t entirely sure  about how to address 
an envelope, but he certainly didn’t have either an  envelope or a stamp on 
hand in the one bedroom apartment he’s renting for the  month.  He also didn
’t have a printer to print out the ballot, since he  generally walks a few 
blocks to the library to print out papers.  He  originally thought that 
today was the deadline for voting by absentee ballot,  but he turned out to be 
wrong on that, so it is possible he’ll learn between  now and election day 
how to use the United States Postal Service. But he has  three major tests 
next week, so he just may not bother.

Now this  is a technologically sophisticated and (we thought) reasonably 
intelligent and  motivated young man.  He sends thousands of text messages a 
month and has  been using email regularly since grade school.  He spends 
hours a day  using his iPhone, iPad and MacBook Air, and I’d classify him as an 
expert user  of some very sophisticated software programs.  But mailing an  
envelope?  He thinks that is a skill with as much use to him as reading  
cursive handwriting, paper maps, and analog clocks—all things, again, that  
people used to master long before reaching voting age.  

I  imagine that us old folks aren’t very sympathetic to someone who hasn’t 
 learned a skill we consider absolutely fundamental to adult living.  But  
you could also argue that requiring post office literacy represents a new 
form  of vote suppression.  I suspect that there are many college students  
similar to my son and that their number is growing all the time.  It  seems to 
me that Maryland should do one of two things: allow my son to  order an 
old-fashioned absentee ballot with a return envelope and hopefully  return 
postage, or complete the transition to electronic voting.  Since  the latter 
seems politically impossible in Maryland, the former would appear  to be the 
only feasible method to eliminate this type of college student vote  
suppression. Alternatively, those who want to encourage college students to  vote 
might want to set up shop on campuses and hand out envelopes and stamps  the 
way they already escort certain disabled groups of voters to the  polls.

If someone thinks this analysis is faulty, please let me  know. 
--J.H. (“Jim”)  Snider, Ph.D. 
President of  _iSolon.org_ (http://www.isolon.org/)   
Administrator  of _RhodeIslandConCon.info_ (http://rhodeislandconcon.info/) 

(202)  540-0505 
For my most  recent op-ed on election law, see _‘Dark  money’ drives R.I. 
constitutional convention votes_ 
(http://www.providencejournal.com/opinion/commentary/20140613-j.h.-snider-and-beverly-clay-dark-money-drives-r.i.-consti
tutional-convention-votes.ece) , Providence  Journal, June 13, 2014. 

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