Denver Post

CON: They take away voter rights
By Al Kolwicz

Sunday, September 15, 2002 - Amendment 28 would drastically harm Colorado's election system. It would take away our right to vote at our own precinct and give us nothing we do not already have.

The amendment would eliminate the precinct voting system, which allows voters to go to their precinct, identify themselves to officials, be handed a ballot to vote in secret, and can personally deposit their unidentified ballot into a locked box. This safe, secret, current system of voting would be replaced by a system fraught with voter intimidation and fraud.

And for what? There is no barrier preventing voters from voting by mail today. Voters can already choose to vote by mail using an absentee ballot, and they may choose to vote in person using the precinct voting system. The amendment adds nothing new.

Florida's 2000 presidential election problems raised public awareness of voting methods. The public has demanded tighter control of ballots; a more accurate way to ensure that the voter's intentions are counted; and more confidence in election results.

Amendment 28 does the opposite of what the public wants. Truckloads of mail-in ballots are dumped into the mail with no control over who really gets them. The privacy curtain is ripped off of the voting booth. Amendment 28 takes away current protections against voter intimidation and vote fraud. And it will destroy the public's trust in election results.

Mail ballots cannot be secret because they require voter identification on the outer envelope. People don't vote freely when their ballot is not secret.

Mail-in ballots are not private. Nobody protects voters from domineering family members and special-interest groups who can intimidate someone to vote a certain way or to hand over their signed mail-in ballot.

In November 2001, more than a million mail-in ballots sent to Colorado voters were not used. These million unwanted ballots were up for grabs, like coupons in the Sunday newspapers.

Unlike our precinct system, unwanted mail ballots can be bought and sold. Laws can't stop voters from voluntarily signing their mail-in ballot and selling it or giving it away to a "worthy cause." We don't want a system where big bucks or zealots control our elections.

Mail-in ballots are not secure. In our precinct system, we can't even get our hands on a ballot until we're in a secure polling place staffed by election officials. Impersonation is risky because there are witnesses.

Don't be confused: A mail-in ballot is not the same thing as an absentee ballot. An absentee ballot is requested by a registered voter. In a mail-ballot system, ballots are mailed out by the millions. They are sent to people who have moved or died. Mail ballots wind up in trash dumps and recycling containers, and in the mailrooms of places like retirement homes, colleges and homeless shelters. These valuable ballots can be scooped up and used to vote. The concept of one person-one vote is killed by Amendment 28.

Signatures on ballot petitions and meeting-attendance sheets are public. Computer scanners and printers that successfully counterfeit money can easily copy signatures onto mail ballots.

Laws won't stop zealots from illegally voting with these bushels of ballots; zealots will do anything to win elections. They'll have lots of time, and there will be no witnesses. If officials suspect fraud, there is no way to find out who to prosecute.

Mail-ballots elections cannot be accurate. In today's precinct system, we know that our vote will be counted. If Amendment 28 passes, thousands of eligible votes may not be counted because of some technicality.

Every mail ballot is examined by officials before it is counted. It is rejected if it isn't signed, if the officials don't like the signature, if the wrong ballot gets into the outer envelope, if the ballot gets delivered late or the judge makes a mistake. If somebody else voted on your ballot, you won't be given a replacement.

This measure doesn't come from the people. Anthony Martinez, Democratic Party candidate for secretary of state, is opposed to Amendment 28 because voter registration files aren't accurate enough. Sunny Maynard, an attorney and the Green party candidate for attorney general, is opposed because voters must give up their privacy. Republicans attending a recent state assembly voted to "oppose the use of mail balloting for state or federal elections until such time as a mail-balloting system can be created that is fair, accurate, secure from fraud, and guarantees secret balloting."

In our current precinct-voting system, every voter gets to vote - once - every vote is counted - once - and every vote is secret. In the proposed mail-ballot system, people can vote many times, good votes get rejected, illegal votes get counted and nobody's vote is secret.

This amendment is dangerous.Vote to protect our elections. Vote "no" on Amendment 28.

Al Kolwicz can be reached at AlKolwicz@qwest.net. He is executive director of Citizens for Accurate Mail Ballot Election Results.