The Alabama House Constitution and Elections Committee hears HB 145 on January 14. It provides that any write-in candidate who wants his or her write-ins tallied must file a declaration of write-in candidacy. A similar bill introduced in both houses of the legislature in 2009 failed to pass. Alabama is one of the few states that permits write-ins in general elections and yet does not require write-in candidates to file a write-in declaration of candidacy. As a result, the state won’t tally the votes for any write-in candidates, even though most counties do so.
In 2008, the Alabama Secretary of State put the write-ins reported by the counties on her web page, along with the election returns for the ballot-listed candidates. But she didn’t tally the write-ins herself, so write-ins for candidates like Cynthia McKinney (who had bona fide campaigns for president but who weren’t on the Alabama ballot) were not included in the sources that compile the national vote totals for presidential candidates, such as the Federal Election Commission’s book titled Federal Elections 2008, and Congressional Quarterly’s America Votes 28. These sources do not consider vote totals “official” unless the state (and not just a collection of counties) report them. Presumably, if the bill is enacted, the Secretary of State will provide such a tally in the future for write-in candidates who file a declaration. Thanks to Ed Still for the news about the bill.
another great step in the right direstion
This is something I tried getting the State to do in 2008 when I was a write-in candidate for US Senate – I even went as far as creating my own Write-in Declaration form, getting it notarized and sending it to the SoS Office.
Good luck. In Indiana we have registered write-ins, and we’re SUPPOSED to count those votes, but most counties do not. Those that do are spotty. And when 3rd parties complain, the answer is that if someone believes the results are invalid, they can pay for a recount. You can’t have a recount unless you’ve counted at least once. Write-in voting is not the same as being on the ballot. Some counties post the names of all write-in candidates in polling places, while others do nothing. There is very little training for poll-workers on counting write-ins. Write-in votes are a sorry excuse for denying ballot access to non duopoly candidates.