Tennessee Legislature May Vote Today on Repealing 2008 Law that Requires Paper Trail for Vote-Counting Machines

Posted on by January 12, 2010
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In 2008, the Tennessee legislature passed a law, requiring that all vote-counting machines must have a paper trail, starting in 2010. Currently, 93 of the 95 counties use electronic vote-counting machines that do not provide a paper trail.

According to this story, the Tennessee Senate will vote on January 12 on a bill to repeal the 2008 requirement. The bill number is unknown, but it is apparently sponsored by State Senator Ron Ramsey. Because Senator Ramsey is also Senate Speaker, he is referred to in the article as Tennessee’s Lieutenant Governor. Tennessee doesn’t have an elected Lieutenant Governor, and its Constitution says that if the governor dies or resigns, the Senate Speaker becomes Governor. Senator Ramsey is a Republican from eastern Tennessee. UPDATE: the Senate did pass the bill on January 12. Now it goes to the House. See this updated story. FURTHER UPDATE: the bill is now through the legislature (the House had passed the bill late in 2009, and Tennessee has two-year legislative sessions).

Libertarian Candidate for Georgia Secretary of State Does His Own Research on Potential Problems with Vote-Counting Machines

Posted on by January 12, 2010
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Georgia is one of the states that uses electronic vote-counting machines that do not leave any paper trail. David Chastain, a leader of the Georgia Libertarian Party and a candidate for the party’s nomination for Secretary of State, recently did his own research into possible vote-counting problems with the machines. He investigated recent special elections with only one item on the ballot.

His press release, showing the results of his research, has already been picked up by The Weekly of Gwinnett County. See this story. It shows that in recent one-issue elections, up to 3% of the voters go to the trouble of showing up at the polls, and then apparently not casting a vote on that single item on the ballot.

Chastain has been interested in this subject ever since he noticed that a 2005 Cobb County special election, to impose a special local option sales tax (“SPLOST”) won by only 114 votes, and that 285 voters went to the polls (in which the tax increase was the only item on the ballot) and apparently cast a blank vote. When he mentioned this at a January 2009 meeting of the State Election Board, the Board seemed uninterested. Later Chastain learned that the Board had then done an investigation, but never communicated this to him, and further found no problem with the vote-counting system. So, Chastain did more research into other elections with only one item on the ballot, as the article recounts.

Arizona Green Party Ruling Likely This Week

Posted on by January 11, 2010
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The hearing in U.S. District Court in the Arizona Green Party case took about 40 minutes. The state defended its law, barring out-of-state circulators from working on a petition to get a party on the ballot, by saying there is no enforcement mechanism to stop out-of-state circulators from working on such a petition. That is a rather half-hearted defense, especially because the petition form is a state form and it says that the circulator is an Arizona resident.

The state defended the February petition deadline by saying that the state doesn’t use random sampling to check petitions for new parties, so it needs extra time. Arizona does use a 5% random sampling procedure to check initiative petitions, and there seems no rational reason why Arizona can’t also use random sampling to review petitions for a new party. A decision is likely by the end of this week.

U.S. Supreme Court Won’t Hear Case on Campaign T-Shirts in Public High Schools

Posted on by January 11, 2010
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On January 11, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear Palmer v Waxahachie Independent School District, no. 09-409. The issue was whether the Constitution protects the ability of a student at a public high school to wear a T-shirt to school that contains a campaign message. In this case, the student wanted to wear a T-shirt promoting John Edwards for president. The U.S. District Court and the 5th circuit had both ruled against the student, and the case is now over. See this story.

U.S. Supreme Court Won't Hear Case on Campaign T-Shirts in Public High Schools

Posted on by January 11, 2010
Reply

On January 11, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear Palmer v Waxahachie Independent School District, no. 09-409. The issue was whether the Constitution protects the ability of a student at a public high school to wear a T-shirt to school that contains a campaign message. In this case, the student wanted to wear a T-shirt promoting John Edwards for president. The U.S. District Court and the 5th circuit had both ruled against the student, and the case is now over. See this story.