California routinely makes a random check of the appearance of voter signatures on voter registration rolls with the appearance of voter signatures on the polling place roster. That process ought to produce empirical evidence about the existence or non-existence of voters who impersonate other voters at the polls.
I once heard a woman voter describing how her son and her husband have the same name (except for middle initial) and the same address. Her son had voted at the polls and had accidentally signed in the line reserved for the husband. The son and the husband have dissimilar handwriting. The woman explained how the District Attorney had then investigated. Apparently the random sample of signatures process happened to catch this. There was no fraud but there was a fraud investigation based on this handwriting
random sample check.
--- On Sat, 12/4/10, David A. Schultz <dschultz@gw.hamline.edu> wrote:
From: David A. Schultz <dschultz@gw.hamline.edu>
Subject: Re: [EL] photo IDs and detection of voter fraud
To: LarryLevine@earthlink.net, election-law@mailman.lls.edu, Mark.Scarberry@pepperdine.edu
Date: Saturday, December 4, 2010, 6:48 AM
Maybe I am just unclear but what seems to have eluded others in my comments is a simple proposition?debates over voter fraud and photo ID are essentially empirical propositions and not matters of conjecture. Let me explain my bias and the issue here.
Public policy should be fact-based. It should be forged not on hopes and beliefs but upon good social science research and empirical facts to guide decisions. Too often we act on belief, hope, conjecture, rumor, and prejudice. None of these should be substitutes for basing policy based on what we know or show.
As I read the debate on voter fraud, those who argue in favor of photo IDs contend that currently there more fraud out there in the election process than is currently detected by the existing election rules and processes. John Fund and many others, including the Minnesota Majority, definitely belief that. If we can take their claims at claims at face value, they are making an EMPIRICAL claim that fraud exists but that it is hard to detect. If that is true, then there must be a way to test or verify their claims. Phrased otherwise, can we reformulate their assertions into testable hypotheses?
One way to test their claim is instituting photo ID. Photo ID should reveal attempted fraud and therefore studies should be able to demonstrate that the implementation of these IDs yields more reports of attempted fraud. Yet no one has produced a study to show this.
This then leads to a backup claim: Implementation of voter ID deters attempted fraud. Ok, good claim but show me the evidence. If you are going to claim it deters attempted fraud then there has to be some baseline pre-existing fraud which you can document and that the new levels of (attempted) fraud show a decrease from that baseline. Thus, this is again an EMPIRICAL claim. Another way to argue this: If photo ID deters attempted fraud then show me the evidence that supports that. Show me how attempted fraud or fraud have decreased as a result of the implementation of the ID. Alas, no evidence is offered because the argument is that without ID we cannot detect and show fraud. The argument here is circular at best.
I would just like supporters of photo ID to be honest. They are advocating for a public policy when they have no real empirical evidence to show that fraud is a significant problem. Be honest like Mark and simply state that he likes ID because it appeases voters who believe (falsely) that fraud is a problem. Just admit that there is no real empirical evidence of serious fraud to support your policy option and we can move on.
Now I happen to believe, especially after working as a housing and economic planner and being a government administrator, and now one who teaches public policy, that laws and policy should be based on facts and not conjecture. I admit some fraud exists in the USA, but the levels are minuscule. The issue is to ask a cost-benefit question. It is impossible to have a 100% fraudless and perfect election system. Errors will exist so long as we are humans. We need to ask what are the additional measures that can be taken to reduce errors and fraud, how likely those measures are to work, and what are the costs associated with those measures. It only makes sense to ask these questions if we have real EMPIRICAL data about fraud that we can assess. David Schultz, Professor
Editor, Journal of Public Affairs Education (JPAE)
Hamline University
School of Business
570 Asbury Street
Suite 308
St. Paul,
Minnesota 55104
651.523.2858 (voice)
651.523.3098 (fax)
http://davidschultz.v2efoliomn.mnscu.edu/
http://works.bepress.com/david_schultz/
http://schultzstake.blogspot.com/
>>> "Scarberry, Mark" 12/04/10 1:16 AM >>>
I suppose, since Larry has joined David in disagreeing with me, I should respond simply to say that David's point seems to me quite unpersuasive. Proponents of photo ID do not argue that it is the lack of a current photo ID requirement that prevents us from documenting the full extent of current voter fraud. I haven?t heard anyone argue that photo IDs are needed to document how much voter fraud, if any, is now occurring. Of course, to the extent people stupidly try to vote with obviously false photo IDs, such attempts at voting fraud would be likely to be detected if there were a photo ID requirement. But such stupid voter fraud attempts are not the kind of voter fraud that proponents worry
about.
I've already stated that I agree that the evidence does not seem to suggest widespread current voter fraud. That does not necessarily mean it is unwise to take steps to try to ensure that voter fraud does not become more prevalent in the future or to try to deter whatever voter fraud may now be occurring beneath the radar or to allow voters to have more confidence in the integrity of the voting system. If I recall correctly, surveys indicate that many voters think it is strange that photo ID is generally not required and that many voters would have more confidence in the system if it were required. Perhaps someone on the list will have the survey information at his or her fingertips.
Best wishes,
Mark
Mark S. Scarberry
Pepperdine Univ. School of Law
From: Larry Levine [mailto:LarryLevine@earthlink.net]
Sent: Fri 12/3/2010 6:57 PM
To: David A. Schultz; election-law@mailman.lls.edu; Scarberry, Mark
Subject: Re: [EL] photo IDs and detection of voter fraud
I'm not sure the matter of voter confidence is relevant. I've never seen anything indicating voters lack confidence in the process of voting. I have seen information that indicates some voters have questions about vote counting, particularly when there is no paper ballot or backup. So, voter confidence as a reason for photo ID seems to be a red herring.
Neither have I seen any evidence of wide spread voter fraud, let alone fraud that would be caught or deterred by photo IDs, in spite of the frequency with which the issue is raised on this list.
It seems to me that the call for photo IDs in the political realm always comes from the same political party. Could the entire subject be a red herring?
Larry
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, December 03, 2010 2:32 PM
Subject: RE: [EL] photo IDs and detection of voter fraud
Mark:
You are still making my point. They will argue that current studies fail to document the full extent of fraud because we do not have photo IDs. At the same time they argue that the use of IDS deters fraud. You cannot argue this points at the same time. The reason is that you have no created an assertionwhere it is impossible to falsify either claim empirically.
I am not interested in what someone can assert but in what on can prove.
David Schultz, Professor
Editor, Journal of Public Affairs Education (JPAE)
Hamline University
School of Business
570 Asbury Street
Suite 308
St. Paul, Minnesota 55104
651.523.2858 (voice)
651.523.3098 (fax)
http://davidschultz.v2efoliomn.mnscu.edu/
http://works.bepress.com/david_schultz/
http://schultzstake.blogspot.com/
>>> "Scarberry, Mark" 12/03/10 4:06 PM >>>
The proponents of photo ID are not arguing that it is needed to detect fraud (so that we can know how much fraud has been occurring). Rather, they are arguing that it is needed to prevent fraud. Most of the prevention would result from deterrence due to the fear of detection, not from actual detection of voter fraud. As Larry Levine?s post suggests, detection would result only in cases of very inept attempted fraud. As he put it, if someone shows up with photo ID that has someone else?s picture on it, that ?would be evidence of stupidity more than fraud.?
As best I can tell, the evidence is strong that currently there are few instances of actual voter fraud of the kind that would be deterred or detected by photo ID laws. Perhaps the stronger argument for such laws is not that they will prevent voter fraud but rather that they will enhance voter confidence in the system. It might also be argued that photo ID laws will give some protection against future corruption of the voting system by future schemes to use voter fraud to rig elections. Isn?t it the case that such schemes have been used in the past? Isn?t it reasonable to be concerned that they might be used again? Of course, to the extent fake photo IDs can be obtained easily, the protection given by a photo ID scheme is reduced. But somehow it seems less likely that people will be willing to obtain fake photo ID for purposes of voting
than that they could be induced to show up at multiple precincts to vote using different names.
Mark Scarberry
Pepperdine Univ. School of Law
From: Larry Levine [mailto:LarryLevine@earthlink.net]
Sent: Friday, December 03, 2010 12:39 PM
To: David A. Schultz; election-law@mailman.lls.edu; Scarberry, Mark
Subject: Re: [EL] photo IDs and detection of voter fraud
That's the kind of evidence that will be suspect on its face.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, December 03, 2010 12:32 PM
Subject: Re: [EL] photo IDs and detection of voter fraud
You make my point exactly.
One cannot simultaneously contend that photo IDs are needed to detect fraud and then also argue that the implementation and use of them reveals no increased fraud because it deters attempted fraud.
However, I am still looking for evidence of increased detection of fraud as a result of IDs.
David Schultz, Professor
Editor, Journal of Public Affairs Education (JPAE)
Hamline University
School of Business
570 Asbury Street
Suite 308
St. Paul, Minnesota 55104
651.523.2858 (voice)
651.523.3098 (fax)
http://davidschultz.v2efoliomn.mnscu.edu/
http://works.bepress.com/david_schultz/
http://schultzstake.blogspot.com/
>>> "Scarberry, Mark" 12/03/10 2:25 PM >>>
The tricky point here is that voter photo ID requirements might be supported because of uncertainty about the amount of voter fraud, but, to the extent implementation of voter photo ID requirements deter *attempts* to commit voter fraud (or are unsuccessful in detecting voter fraud), little useful data will be generated. I don?t suppose any variation in turnout could be determined to be caused by deterrence of voter fraud, because lots of other factors are at work.
Mark Scarberry
Pepperdine Univ. School of Law
From: election-law-bounces@mailman.lls.edu [mailto:election-law-bounces@mailman.lls.edu] On Behalf Of David A. Schultz
Sent: Friday, December 03, 2010 11:46 AM
To: election-law@mailman.lls.edu
Subject: [EL] photo IDs and detection of voter fraud
One of the arguments among advocates of photo voter IDs is that currently we do not know the full scope of potential voter fraud without them. This is because the fraud is undetected. There is thus an empirical argument here. Specifically, the implementation of photo ID for voting should reveal or detect fraud that was otherwise previously hidden.
Are there any studies or analysis on the use of photo voter IDs that address this issue? Have any states that have instituted photo IDs produced numbers or stats on changes in reported or detected fraud? I would be interested to see or know about these studies for a paper I am constructing.
Thank you.
David Schultz, Professor
Editor, Journal of Public Affairs Education (JPAE)
Hamline University
School of Business
570 Asbury Street
Suite 308
St. Paul, Minnesota 55104
651.523.2858 (voice)
651.523.3098 (fax)
http://davidschultz.v2efoliomn.mnscu.edu/
http://works.bepress.com/david_schultz/
http://schultzstake.blogspot.com/
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