On November 10, the California Secretary of State’s office confirmed that it will follow past practice, and tally votes for the declared write-in candidates for president even if the voter didn’t write-in anyone for vice-president. Thanks to the Frank Moore for president campaign staff for this news.
In the District of Columbia, an attorney for the Center for Competitive Democracy has requested the Board of Elections to tally the votes for the declared write-in presidential candidates. In the past, the D.C. Board has not tallied the votes for declared write-in candidates, saying that it is sufficient to simply announce how many votes all of them collectively received. In 1975, a D.C. Superior Court ordered the Board of Elections to “count” the votes for declared write-in presidential candidates, but the Board has never followed this court order. Also, in 1999, a U.S. District Court in D.C. ordered the Board to count the votes on a medical marijuana initiative. The Board then did so, and learned that the initiative had passed (Congress had passed a law telling the Board not to count the votes on that initiative, but that law was declared unconstitutional). One can imagine the reaction if the Board had “counted” the votes on the medical marijuana initiative by simply announcing the number of votes cast, without specifying how many “yes” votes and how many “no” votes there were.
we’ll see how well the totals for McKinney in Missouri are tallied. Currently they list all the write-ins in Cass County as McKinney votes, which makes no sense (unless one wants to claim that McKinney really did get 200 write-ins in Cass County)
Interesting. I often note — in looking at MN election results online a tally for a write-in candidate that either does not name the candidate or I cannot find out anything about the candidate.
Historically, write-in votes were probably the first paper ballot — replacing the public oral voting that occurred. Of coarse, that did not stop the USSC from upholding a ban on writing in voting.
I don’t think comparing the presidential vote to an initiative is a good analogy. With the initiative, either “yes” or “no” MUST win. In an election, if all the write in votes combined are less than a plurality, who the write in votes are for cannot affect the outcome. Only if they are a plurality would you need to see if any one person received enough to win. I’m not saying the DC Board shouldn’t count the write ins, but I see their logic.
If we accept the idea that jurisdictions shouldn’t count write-in votes for declared write-in candidates, that is a slippery slope, and then jurisdictions might say they are only going to count the votes for Republican and Democratic nominees since everyone knows no one else won.
Bush v Gore said the US Constitution requires the states to treat each voter equally. That means, if the government is going to count the votes cast by Voter Smith, then it must count the votes cast by Voter Jones.
Did any one write in Frank MacKay for President?
I should think with all the shillings he spread around in the Golden State of California, at least two would have voted for him from the Bay Area.
Back ground: votes in Missouri’s Cass County for any one ‘left’ of the GOP or CP? Cass County is just south of Kansas City, geographically.
Politically and socially it is a combination of Far Right Libertarian [Arizona style] and Deep South racial devide. My parents,just north of Cass County, originally from the Carolinas, were a couple of notches away from KKK [via the White Citizens Council] and they were ‘too liberal’ for most of our Cass County friends.
200 Cass County votes for Left Hook Lucy and the Greens? Maybe 20! Maybe!
Write ins for Frank MacKay? Oh, after ordering Blare to keep Rodney Martin off of the SoS site and squashing the moral, legal, lawful Nader /Gonzales Frank endorses No Longer a Maverick Insane McCain ???? That is not ‘reform’: that is just politics as usual!
14th Amdt, Sec. 2 is still part of the U.S.A. Constitution — regardless of armies of MORON lawyers and courts.
Interesting…. I wrote in Ron Paul in California, in Orange County, and there was no indication that a write-in for VP was required, or any separate place to put it. It was on one of the rotary wheel machines, where you spin the wheel to move over a keyboard, then select the letters one-by-one.
Glad to hear my vote will count.
It seems like an obvious rule, though — since we’re voting for the qualified write-in candidate for president’s slate of electors, it would be up to them to decide who to vote for for the VP slot anyway.