"Larson splits with caucus rivals on redistricting"
The Hill offers this
report.
FEC Releases Report on Party Financial Activity in
2004
The report is summarized here,
with links to additional data. Among the findings: " Republican
national, state, and local committees who report to the FEC raised
$784.8 million during 2003-2004 in federally permissible “hard money.”
Democratic committees raised $683.8 million. Democratic party receipts
were more than 89% higher than in the comparable period during the 2000
presidential campaign, while Republican party fundraising grew by 46%
when compared with the same period. Overall, these hard money totals
for both parties’ national committees were greater than their combined
hard and soft money raised in any prior campaign."
"The Coming Crackdown on Blogging"
Be sure not to miss this
interview with FEC commissioner Brad Smith over at CNET News on
proposed FEC rulemaking to deal with internet-based campaign activity.
"Fraud Claims Put Postal Voting on Trial"
The Guardian (UK) offers this
report.
SSRC Issues Final Report on Election Adminstration
Challenges
Today the National Research Commission on Elections and Voting, an
SSRC committee, issued CHALLENGES
FACING THE AMERICAN ELECTORAL SYSTEM: RESEARCH PRIORITIES FOR THE
SOCIAL SCIENCES, its final report. It also released this
bibliography and this press
release. From the press release:
The Commission’s experts outlined a comprehensive agenda for
research that could lay the groundwork for effective across-the-board
reforms, including:
1. Improving the process of registration and
voting, so as to increase voter participation while lessening
opportunities for fraud. Opportunities for research include systematic
assessments of the strengths, weaknesses, and consequences of different
registration and voting systems (such as provisional ballots and
no-excuse absentee voting). Research is also needed to evaluate
mechanisms that can increase transparency and the legitimacy of the
registration and voting process.
2. Assessing prototypes for nonpartisan election administration, in
order to reduce conflicts of interest and strengthen oversight
mechanisms that increase voter confidence. Opportunities for research
include case studies of states and municipalities that already have
taken steps in this direction, comparative investigations of
institutions in other nations, and evaluations of the trade-offs
associated with different oversight systems.
3. Improving voter participation and removing barriers to voting, by
examining the extent and significance of: subtle forms of racial
discrimination; variations in access to polling places (including
knowledge of polling place locations, average distance, and wait
times); and real and perceived barriers to voting by certain groups
such as immigrants, former felons, and people with cognitive
impairments.
4. Evaluating options to reform our democratic institutions so that
elections are fully competitive, fair, and perceived to be legitimate.
Opportunities for research include continuing analysis of the Electoral
College and its future role in determining America’s leaders, as well
as the need for reform of the highly partisan redistricting process.
I was very happy to see these priorities listed. The first two,
registration reform and nonpartisan election administration, are two of
my top three election administration reforms that I advocate in my
draft artcle, "Beyond the Margin of Litigation: Reforming U.S. Election
Administration to Avoid Election Meltdown," that I've just sent out to
law reviews. [
UPDATE:
I should add that I see the third research area of SSRC as a subset of
points 1 and 2. Point 4 should be addressed, in my view, separately
from any concerns about election administration reform.] My third
proposed reform, apparently not addressed by the SSRC report, relates
to how to restructure court involvement in election controversies to
encourage more pre-election litigation and discourage post-election
litigation.
In any case, it is good to see these items remaining high on the
agenda. It is always my fear that the media and general public won't
pay attention to these issues until September 2008, when the phone will
start ringing again with reporters asking the question: "If the system
is so bad, why hasn't anything been done to fix it?"