TESTIMONY of REPRESENTATIVE TIM MOORENORTH CAROLINA HOUSE of REPRESENTATIVES
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COMMITTEE on HOUSE ADMINISTRATIONU.S. HOUSE of REPRESENTATIVES
WASHINGTON, D.C.
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On House Bill 2457 To amend the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 to require States to permit individuals to register to vote in an election for Federal office on the date of the election.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2007
Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee for allowing me to offer my perspective on House Bill 2457 and same-day voter registration. As a US citizen, it is a great honor to offer my observations before this body. As a former co-chair of the North Carolina House Committee on Election Law and Campaign Finance Reform it was within my capacity as a state representative serving Cleveland County, NC to offer a minority party opinion on same day voter registration.
Our General Assembly passed legislation creating same-day voter registration this past legislative session with the enactment of House Bill 91. I opposed the measure in our legislature and offered reasonable amendments to this legislation, and although the bill passed, I remain opposed to same-day voter registration, even if it is based on the best of intentions.
Support for same-day voter registration is based on the very noble intention of increasing participation by more of our citizens in the very serious civic responsibility of voting in fair and free elections, but I don’t think any member of this committee or this Congress would disagree that the issue of voter confidence is as important as voter participation.
Whether or not same-day voter registration actually increases overall voter participation is still disputed, but most would agree that voter confidence in a fair, free and honest election process would certainly increase overall voter participation.
While easing the enrollment of new voters might increase overall participation, same-day voter registration, is certainly putting the cart before the horse.
Same-day voter registration has the real potential to decrease confidence in the integrity of the electoral process, and in turn, may actually decrease the level of confidence in our respective legislative bodies.
If our goal is to simply increase turnout, I suppose we could place a cardboard box on every street corner for a couple of days and invite everyone to simply drop off a ballot at their convenience. I suspect we might see a 400 percent increase in voter participation right away, as this would certainly make it easier to vote and probably increase participation, but concern about voter fraud would be more than evident.
On the other hand, if we were obsessed only about the integrity of the election, I suppose we might go to the ridiculous extreme of requiring a DNA sample before voting, or require a home visit by election officials and five sworn witnesses to assure voters are residents of the district where they cast a ballot.
Such absurd examples show there must be a balance between insuring reasonable confidence in the election process and ease of voting. It is my assessment as a state legislator that same-day voter registration in North Carolina tips the balance in a dangerous way, inviting fraud and potentially lowering expectations and confidence in elections, and in turn, confidence in those who are duly elected.
As the committee considers this bill, I want to reiterate my objections to similar legislation enacted in North Carolina. North Carolina’s House Bill 91 permits citizens to register at “one-stop” voting sites operating to facilitate “no-excuse early voting,” from the third Thursday before an election until the Saturday immediately prior to Election Day.
Before House Bill 91 became law, voters were required to register at least 25 days before Election Day. The time between registration and Election Day afforded the local Elections Board enough time to verify the physical address and eligibility of newly registered voters. Without this time there is concern that Boards cannot fully ensure eligibility. House Bill 91 requires minimal proof of ID, but items as simple as a utility bill are easy to fabricate and nearly impossible to verify.
It is true that same-day voter registration ballots are given the status of Provisional Ballots, but in North Carolina, Provisional Ballots are essentially counted as absentee ballots in official counts.
To register and vote at the early voting period on the same day in North Carolina requires less identification than needed for airline travel. How could this measure possibly increase voter confidence, when under this new law, it is harder to cash a check at the grocery store than it is to register and vote?
It is my understanding that a significant number of the ballots of our military citizen’s serving overseas, were deemed ineligible because they were not returned to North Carolina in time due to logistical problems with the mail in and out of a war zone. Finding a solution to this problem is one way Congress could improve voter participation and instill greater confidence in the electoral process.
North Carolina is experiencing phenomenal population growth. Some estimates say as many as 450,000 of those are illegal foreign nationals. The same day registration proposals make it more possible for ineligible persons to cast a ballot. It is argued by some that voter confidence is the primary reason for lower participation, and not the difficulty of voting. Put simply, voters expect their votes to count and for only legitimate ballots to be counted.
For those North Carolinians already registered and presumably verified, our law not only lacks identification requirements for early voters, it also lacks identification requirements for those voting on Election Day.
When it became apparent that our same-day voter registration legislation would pass, I introduced an amendment requiring photo ID for same-day voter registration. It was ultimately defeated along partisan lines and opposed by the Democratic leadership of both Houses of our General Assembly. My intent was to moderate the legislation and to set-up safeguards for the integrity of electoral process.
Before and during debate the state House was shown examples of voter fraud, where registered voters were turned away from the ballot box because records showed they had already voted. This occurred almost certainly because another individual had misrepresented themselves and voted in their place. Because there are no photo ID requirements in place, legitimate voters were already being disenfranchised due to voter fraud.
Even if the number of such examples is only proportionally low, to any such disenfranchised voter, the confidence in the election process is forever tainted with suspicion.
While researching this issue in other states, it appeared more appropriate to require photo identification prior to registration. Without digressing into discussion of photo identification by itself, I feel it is worth mentioning in light of the booming trade of identity theft. It seems more appropriate to increase and not decrease the security component for voting.
It is argued voter fraud is no higher in states with same-day voter registration. But to ignore voter fraud, is to ignore the reality that identity crime remains very difficult to prove.
The anecdotal evidence in North Carolina is, when fraud occurs, rarely is there enough evidence to prosecute, and with voter fraud there is no way to invalidate fraudulent votes.
I believe that the disenfranchised citizens who have their votes stolen, due to our same-day voter registration will take from that experience a perception that the people elected to represent them and the electoral system are illegitimate.
Finally, I would like to stress to the committee that despite my worries about what I have likened to a dangerous experiment with same-day voter registration in North Carolina, the issue addressed by House bill 2457 does still rightly belong to the States.
In this case it would be best not to enact H.R. 2457. This appears to be one example where a state’s interest in regulating the administrative functions of voter registration would best protect the most basic of civil rights. As a state legislator who has demonstrated a commitment to improving the actual and the perceived integrity of North Carolina’s election process, we all can benefit from the differing experiences presented by forty nine other examples there for all of us to discover what works.
With relatively few states enacting same-day voter registration, there should be no rush by Congress to impose such an experiment on every state. With such vast numbers of Americans concerned with confidence in government, securing the right to vote ought to be of higher priority than opening the door wider for those already engaged in actual fraud or where the election process is already perceived as tainted by fraud. Nor should this committee and this House fix what is not broken in those states who have more strident voter registration requirements.
Trusting this committee is concerned with the actual integrity and the perception of legitimacy of American elections, I respectfully ask that you not enact House Bill 2457.
Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee for allowing me this opportunity.
Representative Tim Moore
North Carolina House of Representatives
District 111
604 Legislative Office Bldg.
Raleigh, NC 27603
(919) 733-4838
TimM@ncleg.net
