September 3, 2004
Denying the Troops a Secret Ballot
Members of the military will be allowed to vote this year by faxing or e-mailing
their ballots - after waiving their right to a secret ballot. Beyond this
fundamentally undemocratic requirement, the Electronic Transmission Service,
as it's known, has far too many problems to make it reliable, starting with
the political partisanship of the contractor running it. The Defense Department
is making matters worse by withholding basic information about the service,
and should suspend it immediately.
The Defense Department is encouraging soldiers to use absentee ballots or
fax votes directly to local officials, when possible. But it also provides
an alternative: Omega Technologies, a private contractor, will accept soldiers'
faxed and e-mailed ballots on a toll-free line, and then send them to the
appropriate local elections office. Handling ballots is always sensitive,
but especially so when, as in this program, they are not secret. An obvious
concern is that votes for a particular candidate could be reported lost
in transit, or altered.
Omega Technologies is not an acceptable choice to run the program. Its chief
executive, Patricia Williams, has donated $6,600 in this election cycle
to the National Republican Congressional Committee, and serves on the committee's
Business Advisory Council. And while everything about the conduct of elections
should be open to public scrutiny, Omega is far too secretive. In an interview,
Ms. Williams refused to say who would handle military votes, and whether
they could engage in partisan politics. "I will not allow the public
to invade the privacy of the employees of Omega," she said.
The secrecy of ballots could be breached at several points: when they are
faxed or e-mailed from the field, when they go through the contractor and
when they are received by local officials. The Pentagon has not explained
why it is acceptable, or legal, to ask soldiers to waive their right to
secret ballots. Laughlin McDonald, director of the Voting Rights Project
of the American Civil Liberties Union, says he cannot recall another group
of voters being asked to give up such secrecy. It is particularly inappropriate,
he says, for soldiers, who are under the direct control of the Defense Department.
Nor is it clear that voting by nonsecret ballots is legal. In Missouri,
one of two states that will allow votes to be e-mailed through the Pentagon
this
year, the Missouri Supreme Court held as early as 1895 that its State Constitution
requires that voting be by secret ballot. North Dakota has also
approved the use of the e-mail voting system for military personnel; about
20 states will allow them to vote by fax.
The Electronic Transmission Service operates with a lack of transparency
that is unacceptable in elections management. The Pentagon is allowing Omega
to keep its staffing secret. There are no provisions for parties or candidates
to inspect Omega's operations or monitor the transmittal of votes. The Pentagon
says the procedures for doing so are an "internal working document,"
which it refuses to make public, and it does not routinely make public how
many ballots pass through the system each year. The Electronic Transmission
Service operated in 2000 and 2002, and in earlier elections, but Ms. Williams
says Omega did not handle ballots in those years. The Pentagon is refusing
to say who did.
The Defense Department has taken a "trust us" attitude. Soldiers
have to trust that military higher-ups will not try to learn their political
choices and hold it against them, and that local elections officials at
home will not reveal those choices. The voters have to trust that no one
at the contractor or the Pentagon will make errors, or intentionally alter
ballots. In a democracy, matters like these should not have to be taken
on faith.
All information posted on this web site is
the opinion of the author and is provided for educational purposes only.
It is not to be construed as medical advice. Only a licensed medical doctor
can legally offer medical advice in the United States. Consult the healer
of your choice for medical care and advice.