1Gundersen
Voter Fraud and Unfair Elections: An American Past-time
By Connor Gundersen
9.22.14
Math 89S: Game Theory and Democracy
History of Fraud
Despite revolutionary changes in technology, voter fraud has remained a facet of American democracy for centuries. In Deliver the Vote: A History of Election Fraud, an American Political Tradition—1742-2004, author Tracey Campbell demonstrates that “election chicanery” is “deeply embedded” in America’s political foundation as it has been treated "as part of the game that one has to practice in order to counteract one's equally corruptcompetitors,” (Shafer). Back when only property-owning white men were allowed to vote in the colonial era, landless men would be given the title to land by a campaign temporarily, vote, then return it. On the flip side, campaigns also paid eligible men to not vote (Shafer). In addition, less elaborate schemes involved the sheriff manipulating voting times, voting locations, and votes themselves (Shafer). Even George Washington himself bought his neighbors alcoholic drinks to win his seat in the Virginia House of Burgesses in 1758 (Shafer). Fraud even reached presidential heights, as the 1844 and 1876 general elections were most likely won by fraud as well (Shafer).
While those examples hold some levity, decades-long voter suppression and injustice ensured after blacks were awarded suffrage (Shafer). Even after intimidation and brutality ended, the more subtle poll taxes and literacy tests took their place (Shafer). Jews were another minority group targeted by foul-play; voter registration was scheduled on Yom Kippur and the Sabbath in New York City in 1908 (Shafer). By the end of the 20th century, vote buying and vote tempering along with voter registration manipulation were still transpiring in Georgia, Kentucky, Illinois, Louisiana, South Carolina, and Florida (Shafer).
Even a US president as recent as Lyndon B. Johnston has evident fraud in his history; he is said to have reached his first senate seat by beating Coke Stevenson in the 1948 Democratic runoff primary through fraud (Tolchin). In his multi-volume study “Means of Ascent,”Robert A. Caro alleges that, even though voter fraud was already high in 1940’s Texas, Johnson’s campaign “raised it to a new level,” (Tolchin). While rumors had persisted for years that Johnson won by fraud, the statement was confirmed by Jim Wells County judge Luis Salas in an interview with Caro (Tolchin). The story starts with Stevenson opening up a 20,000-vote lead. Votes had not yet been counted from San Antonio, where Stevenson won 2-1 in the first primary (Tolchin). When the results finally came in, they somehow revealed a 10,000-vote victory for Johnson, then later that night some rural percents went on to shrink Stevenson’s lead to 854 votes (Tolchin). The next day, county officials “discovered” that one county’s returns had not been counted, and these votes went largely to Johnson (Tolchin). After this, more good results continued to trickle in for Johnson until Tuesday, when the State Election Board announced Stevenson was winning by 349 votes with only 40 votes left uncounted (Tolchin).
But this declaration did not end the fishy business, for on Friday, there were “corrections” out of the Rio Grande Valley; Stevenson’s lead was now at 157 votes (Tolchin). Finally, Jim Wells County “amended” its returns, and Johnson had now pulled ahead and won by 87 votes (Tolchin). Caro verifies Stevenson’s supporters complaints at the time that counters had blatantly changed the tallys, as “For example, [Salas] said, Jim Wells County provided an extra 200 votes for Johnson merely by changing the 7 in ‘765’to a 9,” (Tolchin). Salas says it was South Texas political magnate George Parr who “manufactured” thousands of votes for Johnson and thus allowed himmake the mind-boggling comeback from a 20,000-vote deficit to an 87 vote-victory (Tolchin). The rest is history of course, as Johnson went on to be the country’s 36th president. This example is important because it shows that blatant fraud was able to work inconspicuously a mere 60 years ago for a major political figure of the time.
Recent History
The electoral process has certainly not been as prone to such obscene cheating in the past decade, but murmurs do persist. Butterfly ballots, hanging chads, absentee ballots, and invalidated votes have all been suggested as possible ways in which the 2000 presidential election was tarnished (Shafer). George W.Bush only won over Al Gore by 537 points, and, according to the Brennen Center for Justice, officials incorrectly identified 12,000 eligible Florida voters as convicted felons and removed them from the voting rolls (Drum). While these votes could seemingly have gone either way, 41 percent of those purged from the list were African-American (Drum). African Americans, who accounted for just 11 percent of the state’s total electorate, favored Gore over Bush by an astounding 86 points (Drum). Still, there is no consensus on what happened, besides that the election was a “national embarrassment” that, as Tracey Cambpell writes, is epitomized by Boss Tweeds’ statement that, “the ballots didn’t decide it, the counters did,” (Shafer).
Some even think fraud occurred for President Barack Obama, as Publicly Policy Polling found that 49% and 52% of GOP voters think that ACORN, a left-leaning group of community-based organizations that was repeatedly embroiled in democratic voting controversies, stole the 2008 and 2012 elections for Obama respectively (Friedersdorf). While they are most likely wrong (ACORN was only found guilty of vast mismanagement, not fraud), the point remains that the idea, if not the practice, of voter fraud is still present in today’s society despite monumental advances in technology and transparency (Friedersdorf).
Throughout the modern era, Democrats have been accused of voter fraud more often than Republicans because, as Larry Sabato and Glenn R. Simpson write in Dirty Little Secrets: The Persistence of Corruption in American Politics, they have more opportunities (Shafer). This is because Democrats are typically trying to register more people and increase turnout, specifically for minorities. The more voters they try to register, “the more likely that ‘quality control’will suffer and fraud will result; every relaxation of voter-registration rules increases the likelihood of ‘mischief,’” (Shafer). On the other hand, Republicans have generally strived to decrease Democratic registration and turnout by setting up barriers to voting (Shafer). Thus, there is a constant struggle between parties for the balance between “inclusion and integrity” that is (Shafer). This historic dynamic makes voter fraud an extremely loaded, high-stakes issue today.
Voter Fraud Today
In the past several years, chatter over voter fraud has reached a fever pitch. According to New York University Law School’s Brennen Center for Justice, eleven states have recently passed legislation requiring votes to show photo identification at the polls, while 16 others have laws pending (Liebelson). Three states now require demonstration of U.S. citizenship, and six states are taking other actions to cut down on fraud (Liebelson). Former member of the Federal Election Commission and current legal fellow at the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation Hans von Spakovsky told journalist Dana Liebelson that these steps are a reaction to “a long history of voter fraud in this country that has been documented and could make the difference in a close election. Voting is a very precious right, and we should make sure we protect that right,” (Liebelson). Pennsylvania state rep. Daryl Metcalfe echoed this logic, saying “The driving factor is common sense. It only makes sense that when you show up to vote, to exercise that very important right and responsibility, that you prove you are who you claim."
(Bingham). With the historical evidence presented earlier, both men have ostensibly strong points.
The Brennen Center’s studies have also shown that about 11 percent of Americans do not possess government-issued photo ID (Lithwick). In addition, no matter their efficaciousness, these new laws clearly affect a certain demographic: younger, poorer, more mobile, non-white, and Democratic (Liebelson). Thus, opponents of the laws argue that this demographical targeting is not incidental and that these laws are “thinly veiled attempts at vote suppression, modern-day poll taxes” (Lithwick). To further the controversy, the Brennen Center, along with other groups, insists that “voter fraud is rare, voter impersonation is nearly non-existent, and much of the problems associated with alleged fraud in elections relates to unintentional mistakes by voters or election administrators,” ("Myth of Voter Fraud.").
Statisitcs support these assertions, for, according to ABC News, “Out of the 197 million votes cast for federal candidates between 2002 and 2005, only 40 voters were indicted for voter fraud, according to a Department of Justice study outlined during a 2006 Congressional hearing. Only 26 of those cases, or about .00000013 percent of the votes cast, resulted in convictions or guilty pleas,” (Bingham). But, as rep. Metcalfe reasoned, these statistics may not be accurate because there is currently no apparatus in place to detect and persecute fraud (Bingham).
Another sensible reason for this legislation, put forth by the Wisconsin Supreme Court as it upheld new legislation there, is that it increases voters’ confidence in their democracy (Levitt). This logic is theoretically sound, as many non-voters abstain because of disillusionment with so many aspects of the electoral process. But Justin Levitt, professor at the Loyola University Law School and expert in constitutional law and the law of democracy, rebuts that “this effect is hard to spot,” as research shows people in states with more restrictive ID laws do not feel much better about the process than people in states without the legislation (Levitt). There are generally two groups that stick to their guns: those who think elections are fair and those who do not (Levitt). What affects voter confidence more than the current laws in places are the results of the election, displaying a shortsightedness not uncommon to the American electorate (Levitt). Thus, with the two sides having statistics, reason, and political motivation to fuel their broader argument, it is imperative to take a closer look at states who have passed or implemented the laws.
State by State Analysis
The state of Georgia has had voter ID law in place since before the general election of 2008. Von Spakovsky uses the state as evidence that the laws do not disenfranchise minorities, as he states that “the turnout of black and Latino voters went way up” for that election (Liebelson). Granted, this was before an election in which Barack Obama was the first African-American presidential candidate from of the two major parties. But in addition to rebutting that these laws suppress the vote, von Spakovsky states that a “remarkably small” number of Georgia residents even applied for an ID after the laws were put in place; this contradicts the foundation of the liberals’ argument, the "unsupported claim of voter ID opponents that there are hundreds of thousands of voters in every state who do not have a photo ID." (Liebelson).
But similar to most other examples in this debate, Georgia’s story has another side. Justin Levitt dissents, reasoning that applications for IDs were low because "Georgia requires a birth certificate for citizens born in the country to get a photo ID" and "requires a photo ID to get an official birth certificate," making it "quite hard to get one,” (Liebelson). He also rebuts the minority turn out claim, saying that registration skyrocketed because Georgia turned into a battleground state from 2004 to 2008, meaning Obama’s prodigious campaign machine was going to register voters and cause a minority voter “tidal wave” with or without pesky ID laws (Liebelson). Again, there are two worthy sides to the debate.
Major legislation has been passed in Wisconsin. In August 2014, the Supreme Court upheld most of their new voter ID laws (Levitt). In addition to the voter confidence argument mentioned earlier, the court upheld the laws mainly because they believe they laws can stop voter fraud (Levitt). The court cited an example of a supporter of Governor Scott Walker supporter who was charged with 13 counts of election fraud, including “'registering to vote in more than one place, voting where he didn't live, voting more than once in the same election, and providing false information to election officials,’” (Levitt). Levitt claims that Wisconsin ID law, based mostly on photo ID’s at the poll, would probably not have stopped any of these counts (Levitt). Thus, although real, voter fraud unfortunately does not always comply with the laws meant to stop it.
In Florida, voter ID law has become a majorly controversial issue. Republican Governor Rick Scott has tried to clear the state’s voter rolls of all non-citizens, an initiative mentioned earlier that has been used in other states; letters have been sent to 2,600 registered voters to “confirm their citizenship” (Liebelson). Like most voter ID initiatives, it appears to be a no-brainer, but The Miami Herald has reported that that it has actually targeted “hundreds of actual citizens who are lawful voters,” (Liebelson). Of the list’s 2,600 voters, 87% were minorities, raising questions of if it was directed towards the typically Democratic black and Latino communities (“Is Voter Fraud a Real”). As a result, the Department of Justice has stepped in to sue Florida on the grounds that the new law violates the Voting Rights Act and the National Voter Registration Act, a 1993 bill that enhanced voting opportunities for many (Liebelson). Scott has subsequently sued the US government for the US Department of Homeland Security’s refusal to show voting officials its immigration database. Evidently, the issue of voter fraud has become intensely political in Florida, obscuring the reason why the laws were first even put in place (“Is Voter Fraud a Real”).
North Carolina is a salient example as it effectively connects historical and modern voter fraud. The state has a long history of absentee ballot fraud, as the state’s dominant Democratic establishments used to “ship thousands of absentee ballots to machine-controlled mountain counties thatwould provide as many votes as were needed,” throughout the 20’s and 30’s (Christensen). More recently, two incidents have invoked absentee fraud. One transpired during the 2010 Yancey County sheriff’s race and was based on allegations that “jail inmates had their time reduced around the same time they filled out mailed-in absentee ballots witnessed and provided by sheriff’s deputies,” (Christensen). In 2002, a Dunn city councilwoman pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor for receiving absentee ballots and returning them with forged signatures (Christensen).
These cases are trivial and are the extent of recent voter fraud in North Carolina; but the new legislation does not even attempt to stop absentee-related fraud; the laws merely cut off a week of early voting and end same-day registration (Christensen). No action had even been taken towards absentee voting at first, with House Majority leader Edgar Starnes of Hickory even proposing a lenient measure that would allow third parties to collect absentee ballots (Christensen). Interestingly enough, Democrat voters tend to use same-day registration and early voting more heavily than Republicans, while Republicans utilize absentee ballots more heavily than Democrats. House Republicans responded to criticism by including a provision in the bill to require absentee ballots to feature a driver’s license number, a social security number, or a non-operating license number, but the fact remains that to commit fraud in North Carolina, absentee voting is clearly the way to go (Christensen).
The final example is Texas, where 51 people have been convicted of voter fraud over the past 10 years (Bingham). Out of these cases, four were voter impersonation, the type that Texas and so many states have passed legislation to stop (Bingham). The law states that registered voters mustpresent “a driver’s license or state ID card, a license to carry a concealed gun, a U.S. military ID card with a photo, a U.S. citizenship certificate with a photo, a U.S. passport, or a state election certificate,” and has been through a long court process since it was first passed in 2012 (Lithwick). Signed into law in 2011, blocked in federal court in 2012, but then reinstated when the Supreme Court struck down a part of the Voting Rights Act in 2013, it currently stands trial again in 2014 (Lithwick).
The Department of Justice, the NAACP, and many other groups say it could disenfranchise up to 787,000 registered, mostly minority Texas voters who lack suitable ID (Lithwick). The rest of the case will hinge on Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which protects minorities again suppression, and whether the Department of Justice can prove that the law directly results in discrimination, a difficult task (Lithwick). While the case is not supposed to be complete by the November elections, it will certainly be a long battle that sets that stage for 2016 (Lithwick).