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I hope you will forgive the length of
this week’s article about Wake’s
election equipment. It is long because I
feel very strongly about voting, its
importance and the need to have
equipment that gives everyone access and
can be relied upon to deliver an
accurate count in a reasonable time
period.
As a child, I believed in
the infallibility of those lever-type
machines with the curtains. One was
delivered in the fall to the gym in our
small-town school, and we always
explored it, trying to make it work. How
disappointing to learn as an adult that
it could be jimmied and the results
changed in any number of ways.
When we lived in Arkansas –
stick and cloth voting booths, paper
ballots and ballot boxes hand-carried to
the county courthouse – there were lots
of stories about lost and stolen ballots
and stuffed ballot boxes. We heard a lot
of the same stories about neighboring
counties when we moved here in 1970.
But it has been refreshing
to be a voter in Wake County, a place
with a professional election board
staff, a competent election board and a
host of intelligent, caring people who
volunteer to work the polls.
Elections here have been
scandal-free – maybe not the
politicians, but the voting process has
been – easy, with clear instructions and
organized ballots.
Everyone has had access to
the voting process; the pity and shame
is that so few people use their right to
vote.
A friend suggested people
might care more if they were told they
could not vote at all or could not vote
unless they were white males who had
paid a poll tax or owned a certain
amount of property.
Voting is a right – and
many, many lives were given to assure
that right to all of us. We need to
honor their memories and vote. |
