Back   OpEd News
Font
PageWidth
Original Content at
https://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_brian_ly_060726_a_voters__bill_of_ri.htm
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).

July 26, 2006

A Voters' Bill of Rights

By Brian Lynch

Federal law should require that every vote cast must be recorded in writing on a visible paper ballot. When it comes to casting or counting votes, democracy only exists on paper. We can only agree on a vote we can see.

::::::::

A VOTERS BILL OF RIGHTS FOR ALL UNITED STATES CITIZENS

FIRST: We should amend the US Constitution to abolish the electoral
college and institute direct popular elections for US President. This
way, every state would be in play during the Presidential election
season.

SECOND: We should add an amendment to the US Constitution making the
act of voting, and the counting of an individuals vote, a protected
right for all United States citizens. This would allow individuals to
bring federal suit against their state government when their voting
rights have been abridged.

THIRD: Once our voting rights have been constitutionally secured on a
federal level, state and local government entities should not be
granted final authority to decide for us on the methods and means used
to register voters, screen voters at the polling stations or to cast
and count our votes. The voting process doesn't belong to the states,
or to political parties or to local government administrations. It
certainly doesn't belong to a handful of private corporations.
Ownership of the voting process belongs to all the people and is
nontransferable. Governments instead should obtain our consent as to
the means and methods we wish to employ in casting and counting votes.
Voting practices and procedures should all be subject to approval
through statewide public referendums.

FOURTH: Federal law should require that every vote cast must be
recorded in writing on a visible paper ballot. When it comes to
casting or counting votes, democracy only exists on paper. We can only
agree on a vote we can see.

Electronic voting machines, if they are to be used, must be required to
print out "official paper ballots" -- not just receipts. The
"official" vote count should come from a publicly witnessed hand
counts of those paper ballots in any race where any candidate requests
a hand count (no legal threshold limitations). The computer tallied
vote count should only be sufficient, and become the official tally,
if all of the candidates for a particular office accept the outcome
of an election based on electronically counted votes. A hand count of
official printed ballots should be any candidate's right, not something
for which they have to file a law suit. A candidate should be entitled
to request and receive hand counted ballots in a specific polling
places, or in specificed voting district or in an entire county or
state. The ability of a candidate to validate the vote count anywhere
and any time is precisely the sort of checks and balances we need to
have full confidence in our democracy.

Brian Lynch
Mine Hill, NJ

Brian Lynch is a social planner and child advocate from Northern New
Jersey with a Masters degree from Rutgers University. He became
interested in voting issues following the 2000 Presidential election
and has been active on the Internet over the past 6 years to raise
public awareness on voting and other social issues.

Submitter: Joan Brunwasser

Submitters Website: http://www.opednews.com/author/author79.html

Submitters Bio:

Joan Brunwasser is a co-founder of Citizens for Election Reform (CER) which since 2005 existed for the sole purpose of raising the public awareness of the critical need for election reform. Our goal: to restore fair, accurate, transparent, secure elections where votes are cast in private and counted in public. Because the problems with electronic (computerized) voting systems include a lack of transparency and the ability to accurately check and authenticate the vote cast, these systems can alter election results and therefore are simply antithetical to democratic principles and functioning.



Since the pivotal 2004 Presidential election, Joan has come to see the connection between a broken election system, a dysfunctional, corporate media and a total lack of campaign finance reform. This has led her to enlarge the parameters of her writing to include interviews with whistle-blowers and articulate others who give a view quite different from that presented by the mainstream media. She also turns the spotlight on activists and ordinary folks who are striving to make a difference, to clean up and improve their corner of the world. By focusing on these intrepid individuals, she gives hope and inspiration to those who might otherwise be turned off and alienated. She also interviews people in the arts in all their variations - authors, journalists, filmmakers, actors, playwrights, and artists. Why? The bottom line: without art and inspiration, we lose one of the best parts of ourselves. And we're all in this together. If Joan can keep even one of her fellow citizens going another day, she considers her job well done.


When Joan hit one million page views, OEN Managing Editor, Meryl Ann Butler interviewed her, turning interviewer briefly into interviewee. Read the interview here.


While the news is often quite depressing, Joan nevertheless strives to maintain her mantra: "Grab life now in an exuberant embrace!"


Joan has been Election Integrity Editor for OpEdNews since December, 2005. Her articles also appear at Huffington Post, RepublicMedia.TV and Scoop.co.nz.

Back