Examining Implementation of the National Voter Registration Act by Nonprofit Organizations: An Institutional Explanation
Kelly LeRoux
Assistant Professor
Department of Public Administration
University of Kansas
Prepared for delivery at the annual meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association, April 22-25, 2010, Chicago, Illinois. This study was funded by a faculty research grant from the University of Kansas Center for Research. Several graduate and undergraduate students deserve thanks for research assistance on this project including Alexandra Bazaliyeva,Megan Dodge, Dustin Swartz, Matthew McGinley, Michael McRoy, and Erin Borry.
Examining Implementation ofthe National Voter Registration Act by Nonprofit Organizations: An Institutional Explanation
Abstract
The 1993 National Voter Registration Act authorizes nonprofit social service organizations to conduct nonpartisan voter registration drives, with theaim of making the process more accessible for low income citizens and segments of the population historically underrepresentedin the political process (Piven and Cloward, 1988). Although more than 15 years have elapsed since this important reform was enacted, very little is known about the extent to which nonprofits have embraced this practice, and what factors explain their decision to do so. Drawing upon institutional theory, this paper examines the propensity of nonprofit social service organizations to carry outnonpartisan voter registration and voter education campaigns in a national election year. A series of hypotheses are tested using data from a random sample of several hundred nonprofit service organizations in the U.S. that were surveyed prior to the 2008 election.Findings suggest that institutional factors, especially state laws, are highly influential in shaping the decision of local level nonprofits to register voters and conduct nonpartisan voter education activities. The paper concludes with a discussion of policy implications of this study.
Key words:nonprofits; institutional theory; state policies; voter registration; social services
In addition to providing critical social services that form the backbone of the American welfare state (Allard, 2009; Salamon, 1995), nonprofit organizations are also recognized as important vehicle for promoting civic engagement and furthering democratic ideals (Putnam, 2007; Skocpol, 2003).One way these organizations promote democracy and civic participation is by registering their clients to vote and encouraging their turnout in elections. Indeed, nonprofits have been described as the “sleeping giants of democracy” (Rongitsch, 2008) because of their unique potential to engage under-represented groups in the electoral process.Section 7B of 1993 National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), also known as the “Motor Voter law” encourages all “non-governmental entities” to register their clients to vote, and mandates that “all agencies receiving state funding” provide such opportunities to their clients stipulating that these activities much be carried out in a nonpartisan fashion.
Despite the potential ofthe U.S.nonprofit social services sector for expanding voter registration, there are no systematic studies to date that examine how widely the NVRA has been embraced by nonprofits, nor have scholars consideredwhy nonprofits choose to carry outnonpartisan voter registration activities. Although the media brought this issue into the national spotlight during the last election by highlighting the misdeeds of community organizing groups like ACORN, nonprofit social service providers are far more numerous and reach many more low-income individuals through their on-going service providing roles, yet these organizations have been given little consideration in the public debate about third party organizations’ involvement in voter registration activities.[i]
The primary goal of the NVRA was to increase the number of citizens who vote in national elections. To accomplish this objective, the law required that public agencies take steps to increase voter registration among low-income Americans (OMB Watch, 2007). The law prescribes specific protocols that if uniformly implemented, would systematically embed voter registration proceduresin public organizations that provide social welfare services, as well as non-governmental organizations that provide these services “by proxy” (Kettl, 1988).[ii]
Despite the mandate for “all agencies receiving state funding” to offer voter registration opportunities on-site during national election years, the law has not beenenforced (OMB Watch, 2007; Kavanaugh et al 2005).[iii] Given that voter registration activities are beyond the scope of theirservice-providing mission and they face no penalty for failure to implement the law, nonprofit leaders may feel little incentive for carrying out election-related activities. Election-related activities consume organizational resources for which the agency receives no compensation. Nevertheless, many nonprofit service agencies do choose to conduct nonpartisan voter register campaigns, which often involves not only registering voters, but also providing various forms of nonpartisan voter education and encouraging clients to go to the polls through nonpartisan get-out-the-vote (GOTV) activities.This raises a number of interesting and timely questions: To what extent are nonprofit service organizations implementing the NVRA and performing adjunct activities of providing nonpartisan voter education and GOTV efforts? What accounts for the variation in nonprofits’ implementation of these activities? What internal and external organizational factors create a climate conducive to implementation of the NVRA by nonprofits, and what factors serve as impediments?
To answer these questions, this study uses survey data from314 nonprofit service organizations in sixteenstates. New institutionalism provides the theoretical lens for this analysis. The findings suggest that multipleinstitutional factors influence the likelihood of nonprofits implementing the NVRA and related voter education and mobilization activities.Among the most importantfactors influencing the behavior of nonprofit service agencies with regard to voter engagement activities are state laws that impose restrictions and penalties on the election activities of third party organizations. These laws have a suppressing effect on nonprofits’ likelihood of implementing the NVRA, and further suppress their efforts to provide nonpartisan voter education and get-out-the-vote efforts. Other institutional explanations include the influence of industry associations, and the disciplinary training of the agency ED/CEO, although demographic characteristics of organizational leaders also accounts some of the variation in nonprofits’ voter registration, voter education, and GOTV activities.
The following section briefly discusses the history of the 1993 National Voter Registration Act, and highlights the key administrative rules issued by the IRSthat governs nonprofits’ participation in elections. Next, the paper turns to a discussion of institutional theory, and develops a set of hypotheses based on the logic of new institutionalism. These propositions are then empirically tested, and the implications of the findings discussed.
Nonprofits’ Role in Elections
The political participation gap among the socioeconomic classes has been well documented by scholars of American democracy and civic participation, demonstrating unequivocally that citizens with greater resources of time, education, and money participate at higher levels in virtually every aspect of the political process (Brady, Verba, and Schlozman, 1995; Rosenstone and Hansen, 1993). According the U.S. Census Bureaufor example, 59 percent of citizens living in households with incomes under $15,000 were registered to vote in 2005-2006, compared to 85 percent of citizens living in households with incomes of $75,000 or more.However, Piven and Cloward argued that public welfare bureaucracies and nonprofit service organizations could play a role in mitigating this persistent imbalance.
In examining alternatives for increasing voter registration among underrepresented groups, Piven and Cloward (1988) proposed making it possible for citizens to register in a wide range of public agencies, including health, housing, welfare and unemployment agencies. These authors called particular attention to the role that community-based nonprofits might play in achieving this objective, because these services today are delivered not by government bureaucracies, but primarily by nonprofit organizations acting as contract partners of the state (Allard, 2009; Salamon, 1995).
Indeed, Piven and Cloward’s ideas were adopted by the Clinton administrationand enacted into law by Congress in the form of the NVRA. One of the goals of adding the public assistance and nonprofit “agency based” registration provisions to the 1993 law was to reduce historic disparities in registration rates byrace, income, age, and disability (Piven and Cloward, 1996). The Motor Voter Act requires all offices of state-funded programs that are primarily engaged in providing services to persons with disabilities to provide all program applicants with voter registration forms, to assist them in completing the forms, and to transmit completed forms to the appropriate state official. The section of the NVRA that specifically applies to nonprofits (Section 7) states that “each State shall designate as voter registration agencies:
(A) all offices in the State that provide public assistance; and
(B) all offices in the State that provide State-funded programs primarily engaged in providing services to persons with disabilities.
(b) Federal Government and private sector cooperation
All departments, agencies, and other entities of the executive branch of the Federal Government shall, to the greatest extent practicable, cooperate with the States in carrying out subsection (a) of this section, and all nongovernmental entities are encouraged to do so.
This language has important implications for nonprofit implementation requirements. Nonprofits providing services to persons with disabilities (such as mental health and substance abuse treatment centers)have a compulsory obligation to implement the NVRA, while implementation is voluntary for all other types of nonprofit service agencies.
Some nonprofit organizations that conduct voter registration drives choose to go a step further in assisting their clients with election participation by providingvarious forms of voter education and/or providing clients with encouragement to vote through frequent reminders and assistance with getting to the polls on election day.Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Service tax code permitsnonprofits to engage in voter education efforts and to encourage voter turnout through get-out-the-vote activities, but expressly prohibits these organizations from engaging in partisan activity or endorsement of any sort.[iv] To minimize confusion on the part of nonprofits implementing voter registration and education campaigns, the IRS issued revenue Rule 78-248, 1978-1 which allows for a wide range of nonpartisan voter education activities by 501(c)3 organizations such as provision of information on voter registration deadlines, objective candidate information, information on ballot measures, assistance in finding polling locations, assistance in filling out a sample ballot, and any other nonpartisan activity intended to increase the likelihood of voter turnout..
Encouraging clients to vote in elections and providing voter education through forums such as candidate debates or information on candidates, their issues positions, voting records, and so on, are clearly permissible so long as the organization’s message is designed to encourage political participation rather than promote a candidate or specific political message (see IRS Revenue Rule 2007-41 for specific examples of non-permissible activities and cases illustrating their application). The IRS ruling makes explicit that 501(c)(3) organizations are permitted to target under-represented groups in their voter promotion activities, as long as the message conveyed by to these groups is nonpartisan.
While there is some evidence indicating that local government public assistance agencies are failing to implement the NVRA (Hess and Novakowski, 2008; Kavanaugh et al, 2005), there are no studies examining implementation of the NVRA among nonprofit service organizations. This study offers a first step toward addressing this gap in our understanding of local level implementation of the NVRA. New institutionalism provides an appropriate theoretical framework for studying the variation in nonprofits’ choice to implement voter registration activities, because nonprofit service agencies are diverse and the institutional environments in which they operate are also diverse, and according to March and Olson, institutions “shape the definition of alternatives and influence the perception and the construction of the reality in which action takes place” (March and Olson, 1995, pg. 25).The next section highlights some of the key tenets of new institutional theory, and sets forth a set of propositions about nonprofits’ choice to undertake voter registration activities based this logic.
Neo-Institutional Theory
Neo-institutional theorists March and Olson define institutions as “the beliefs, paradigms, codes, cultures, and knowledge that support rules and routines” (March and Olson, 1989, 22). Douglas North defines institutions as“regularities in actions….customs and rules that provide a set of incentives and disincentives for individuals” (North, 1986, p. 281). Yet, Powell and DiMaggio argue that the new institutionalism is different from rational choice logic because it contains a distinctly normative element that views standards of behavior as being defined by customs and obligations (Powell and DiMaggio, 1991).Institutional theory thus leads to several hypotheses about the effects of rules, laws, beliefs, informal codes, culture, and knowledge on nonprofits’ propensity to carry out voter registration activities.
Institutional theory emphasizes the logic of appropriateness based on organizational structures, rules, laws, legal frameworks, as well as informal codes, cultures, and knowledge (Frederickson and Smith, 2003).The logic of appropriateness suggests that action is dictated by perceptions of what is regarded as appropriate or exemplary behavior (March and Olsen, 1979).Evidence from the state policy diffusion literature suggests that state laws play a substantial role in shaping the behavior of local-level entities, be they municipalities, business firms, or other types of organizations (McCoy, 1940; Eisinger, 1988, Rogers, 1995; Strang and Soule, 1998; Frederickson and Johnson, 2001). Rules and laws are adhered to because they are perceived with legitimacy. The logic of appropriateness suggests that restrictive state laws pertaining to voter registration by third party organizations will have a depressing effect on nonprofits’ propensity to register voters and provide voter education. For example, a CEO of a nonprofit located in a state such as Florida may be very reluctant to carry out voter registration activities within his or her organization due to a state law which imposes fines on charities for each voter registration form not submitted within ten days of its completion.[v]
State laws regarding voter registration deadlines may also influence nonprofit service organizations’ actions with regard to voter registration and related activities. People tend to pay more attention to an election as it gets closer(Green and Gerber, 2004; Lau and Redlawsk, 2006). This may also be true for leaders of nonprofit organizations who are too preoccupied with managing day-to-day service delivery to devote their attention to voter registration activities until election day is on the immediate horizon.Nonprofits located in states with very conservative voter registration deadlines such as Ohio or Georgia (30 days) may be less inclined to carry out voter registration as those with more liberal voter registration deadlines such as Kansas (15 days).[vi] Thus, the following two hypotheses about the effects of state laws are proposed:
H1: Nonprofit service agencies located in states with restrictive laws governing the voter registration activities of third party organizations will be less likely to register clients to vote, provide nonpartisan voter education, and engage in nonpartisan GOTV activities.
H2: Nonprofit service agencies located in states with more conservative voter registration deadlines will be less likely to register voters or provide nonpartisan voter education than those located in states with more liberal deadlines.
State political culture may also influence nonprofits’ propensity to become involved in elections. “Blue state” status is suggestive of a political culture that is more liberal, whereas “red state” status suggests a political culture that is more conservative. Legally enabling third party organizations to register voters is a federal policy that has been openly criticized by conservative members of Congress. Even though nonprofits are required by federal tax law to register voters in a nonpartisan fashion, conservatives have opposed this policy fearing that it will privilege Democratic candidates. If the conservatives’ perception is accurate, nonprofits that are located in a “blue states” should be more likely to register voters and provide voter education.
H3:Nonprofit service agencies located in “blue states” will be more likely to register clients to vote, provide nonpartisan voter education, and engage in nonpartisan GOTV activities.
Institutional theorists have demonstrated that organizations of the same type become isomorphic over time because they are exposed to the same expectations and constraints (Powell and DiMaggio, 1991). However, practices among nonprofit social service organizations may fail to homogenize in this way because their chief executives do not share a single common profession or discipline; an important mechanism through which isomorphism occurs. Disciplines and professions represent normative learning institutions, or a type of institutional linkage through which members are socialized into a common set of professional norms, values, and beliefs(Powell and DiMaggio; Frederickson and Smith, 2003). One of the key distinctions between the “old” institutionalism and new institutionalism is way the organizational context is defined. The former emphasized the influence of local communities and operating environments, whereas the new institutionalism emphasizes the influence of “non-local” environments such as “organizational sectors or fields roughly coterminous with the boundaries of industries, professions, or national societies” (Powell and DiMaggio, 1991, p 13).
Disciplines, and the networks associated with them thus provide an important mechanism for the diffusion of information and for the instillation of common norms, values, heuristics, and practices. For example, advocacy, political action, and a commitment to social justice are commonly-shared values of the Social Work discipline (National Association of Social Workers, 2005). Historically, nonprofit social service leaders were trained as social workers, and this is still the case in many organizations. More recently however, it has become increasingly common for nonprofits to be led by persons trained in business management (Ott, 2001). To a lesser degree, public management and law are also professions represented among nonprofit Executive Directors. Thus, one explanation for nonprofits’ variation in carrying out voter registration activitiesis that they are managed by individuals with differing professional norms and values.