On December 30, the Oregon Supreme Court issued a one-paragraph opinion, upholding a decision of the State Court of Appeals that signatures of persons on the inactive voter list are not valid. Whitehead v Fagan, S068382.
The decision relates to whether a statewide initiative, Petition 50, should be on the ballot. It had enough valid signatures if inactive voters counted, but now it won’t appear on the ballot. The subject of the initiative is for a carbon-free economy by the year 2050.
The decision seems irrational. The reason voters are transferred to the inactive list is that the post office has indicated the person has moved and has not re-registered at the new address. But when such a voter signs an initiative petition, that voter is giving fresh information about his or her current address. In many states, the new information about the address is then used to transfer that voter back to the active list, and to count the signature.
When and where things are done — or NOT done.
Oregon is playing hardball. I always thought that petitioners told signers they could only sign if they vote? They should!
Petitioners typically ask people if they are registered to vote. But for an inactive voter that is a somewhat ambiguous question.
Of course, they could always lie about addresses and forge signatures. We all know how much Democrats love doing that.
@RW,
Initiative 50 was a 2016 initiative to protect private voter information. I don’t know why the legal action took so long. Perhaps they realized much later why the initiative failed. The validity rate was 70.2% which is reasonably good. It was short by 4081 signatures. This might imply 11.2% of rejected signatures were from inactive voters. It is conceivable that an inordinate number of inactive voters signed the petitions. Some voters deliberately don’t want be contacted, particularly by government officials, politicians, party zealots, or commercial interests.
The Superior Court was in favor of the SOS, the Court of Appeals reversed on a 2-1 decision, and the Supreme Court has reversed that, affirming the Supreme Court.
The formatting of the Supreme Court opinion may have confused you. The second page is almost entirely blank, but the actual opinion begins on Page 3 (through 17).
It is possible that Oregon’s all-mail ballot scheme may have had an effect. Mail ballots can not be forwarded. So the most likely reason the election officials believes a voter has moved is that a ballot is returned as undeliverable. Before they can change the status to inactive they must send a forwardable notice to the voter.
In a conventional in-person voting state, an inactive voter can vote by simply showing up at the polls.In Oregon, an inactive voter who didn’t receive a ballot could simply contact election officials and be reactivated. This would be fine for a general election, but wouldn’t be helpful for petition signing.
Oregon’s system of AVR may reduce the number of inactive voters since updating a driver’s license will update an existing registration. However, people who disappear may be less concerned about having an accurate address.
A law passed this year may reduce inactive voters. Under the previous law not voting for five years would place someone on the inactive list. This likely is a violation of federal law. Under the new law a ballot could be sent to new tenants for years, and so long as the USPS did not notice that the recipient did not live there, election officials would not be any wiser.
Richard Winger question: something I’ve always wondered, why aren’t census and annual tax returns used to update voter addresses? The Census would make the most semse, but imagine it’s due to the 72-year privacy law.
This is a VERY BAD court ruling which is going to make gathering petition signatures for ballot issues and candidates a LOT more difficult.
If a person is listed on the voter rolls, their signatures should count on petitions. This decision is completely irrational.
Another case that supports letting petitioners, for candidates, parties and initiatives, file fees in lieu of petition signatures.
@Andy,
AVR probably makes it harder since more voters are registered to vote, and all-mail ballots means that more actually vote which increases the threshold for initiatives.
A circulator could simply ask to see a driver’s license so that addresses are legible, and if the voter says that the name or address is out of date help them update their driver’s license and registration.
@WZ,
We could do the same for the elections.
Jim, people are not always willing to pull out a drivers license. Lots of time there is no time for that. Also, people are not always registered to vote at the same address as on their drivers license, and lots of people with drivers licenses are not registered to vote at all.
@Andy,
In Oregon voters are automatically registered to vote when they get a driver’s license (if they are a citizen), unless they opt out. The registrations are updated when they update a driver’s license.
Why would anyone sign a piece of paper, give you their legal name and address, but not be willing to show you their ID?