Last week's announcement of the inconclusive results of a massive media recount of Florida's 2000 presidential vote was a reminder of the electoral crisis that riveted the country a year ago -- and a reminder, as well, of the democratic ideals that we are defending in the war against terrorism. And in fact, the media recount was conclusive in one important respect: an even larger number of Floridians had their votes discounted or miscounted than early estimates indicated.
Yet, perversely, election reform is one of those Congressional priorities that seem to have fallen by the wayside after September 11. It should, if anything, have risen higher on the national agenda now that we have learned we cannot take the privileges of a democratic society quite so much for granted as we have in the recent past. Indeed, as we suggested in the new special issue of Blueprint magazine, the three overriding national priorities for the foreseeable future should be maintaining security, restoring prosperity, and strengthening democracy.
Some observers say the issue of electoral reform has faded because Americans are united behind the war leadership of President George W. Bush, and so do not wish to be reminded of the electoral irregularities that cast a shadow over his inauguration and first months in office. We say the new spirit of national unity means that election reform is no longer a partisan Democratic passion, and should be promoted by both parties as a matter of principle.
As David Broder argued in a recent column in The Washington Post, the early disputes in Congress over various versions of election reform are largely moot. There's only one bill with a realistic chance of enactment before the next election cycle: the bipartisan compromise measure pending in the House, hammered out by Reps. Steny Hoyer (D-MD) and Bob Ney (R-OH). While the bill is not perfect from our point of view, it does strike a decent balance between state flexibility in supervising elections and national uniformity with respect to certain basic rules. It provides funds to replace archaic punch-card machines with modern voting technology, and requires four crucial reforms in every state: maintenance of statewide voter registration lists; specific standards for vote counting; provisional voting in cases of registration challenges; and an opportunity for voters to correct mistakes before leaving the polling place.
Since Congress is likely to stay in session until well into December to complete appropriations bills and a possible economic stimulus package, it should urgently take up election reform as a Christmas gift -- and as an anniversary reminder -- for American voters. Election reform would also be a far more worthy beneficiary of some of the enormous political capital the President has mustered than the accelerated tax rate cuts for the wealthy and for corporations that seems to be the primary legislative priority of White House lobbyists at the moment.
We are fighting in Afghanistan for, among other things, our democratic values. The right to vote is central to those values. Here at home, it's time to do everything possible to make every precious vote count.
