Delivering Democracy
Postal service unions pitch vote-by-mail to top elections officers
year, over 40 percent of ballots were
mail-in. Twenty-four other states allow
no-excuse “absentee” ballots, but vot-
ers have to request them before each
election. Twenty-two other states and
the District of Columbia require an ex-
cuse before voters can use a mail bal-
lot — like being out of the state on
military service, out of town during
the election, or too ill or disabled to go
to a polling place.
Vote-by-mail produces a marginal
increase in mail handled by the Postal
Service, but its appeal to postal unions
isn’t about economics, said Cliff
Duffy, executive vice president of the
American Postal Workers Union.
“It’s a pride issue,” Duffy said. “It’s
a source of pride for us to imagine we
could become part of the voting
process in this country.”
Oregon’s experiment in vote-by-
mail was a years-long priority for Port-
land-based National Association Letter
Carriers Branch 82, which cam-
paigned for the 1998 referendum that
put it in place. Branch 82 then helped
pass a pro-vote-by-mail resolution at
the Oregon AFL-CIO convention that
went on to win approval at the 2005
convention of the national AFL-CIO.
“It’s a classic fight for access to
polls,” says Branch 82 President LC
For several years, the U.S. Postal
Service and its unions have been advo-
cating that “vote-by-mail” replace tra-
ditional Election Day polling stations.
In July, they took their message to a
Portland meeting of state elections of-
ficials from around the country, and
were backed up by Oregon Secretary
of State Bill Bradbury.
Oregon reclaimed its mantle as a
electoral pioneer in 1998 when it be-
came the first state in the nation to
conduct all elections entirely by mail.
In state after state where voters are
given the choice to vote by mail, vot-
ers are flocking to it, Bradbury told at-
tendees at the summer conference of
the National Association of Secretaries
of State. In Oregon, Bradbury said,
“voting fits into our lives; we don’t
have to fit our lives around voting.”
Oregon is still the only state to con-
duct elections entirely by mail, but
Washington is moving in that direc-
tion. Last year 31 out of Washington’s
36 counties held elections by mail, and
next year, all counties but one are ex-
pected to do so. Meanwhile, California
and Colorado have what’s called “per-
manent no-excuse absentee ballots,”
where any voter can opt to get all fu-
ture ballots in the mail rather than vot-
ing at poll stations. In California last
From left to right: Vote By Mail Project Director Adam Smith; National
Association of Letter Carriers (NALC) Executive Vice President Fred
Rolando; Oregon Secretary of State Bill Bradbury; and NALC Branch 82
President L.C. Hansen. The four pitched Oregon’s vote by mail system at the
July 15-18 summer conference of the National Association of Secretaries of
State at the Portland Hilton.
Hansen. “We’re working people and
shift workers. Often our schedules
don’t permit easy access to the polls.”
Vote-by-mail plays to union
strengths, explains Adam Smith, a for-
mer Oregon Nurses Association labor
representative who is now director of
the non-partisan Vote By Mail Project.
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First, vote-by-mail produces much
more accurate voter databases. Mail-in
ballots aren’t forwarded, so when bal-
lots are returned to sender (county
elections offices), voters’ names are re-
moved from the active list, and letters
are sent out to their new addresses re-
minding them to re-register. Then, bal-
lots are in voters’ hands for two and a
half weeks, giving groups like unions
an extended opportunity to reach mem-
bers by mail, phone and personal con-
tact. Union get-out-the-vote campaigns
can get daily updates from elections of-
fices about who has voted, allowing
them to focus phone calls, mailings
and door-to-door visits on those who
haven’t yet.
And volunteer-rich conservative
groups can take equal advantage of
vote-by-mail mechanics, Smith said.
Basically, it breathes new life into
door-to-door people politics, in an era
dominated by television ad politics.
“Vote-by-mail leverages the value
of person-to-person contact,” Smith
said.
In Oregon, vote-by-mail has helped
organized labor produce a union
turnout and electoral result that are the
envy of unions elsewhere in the nation,
said Oregon AFL-CIO President Tom
Chamberlain.
“It gives strength to any grass-roots
organization,” Chamberlain said, “any-
thing that’s driven by volunteers and
membership.”
“And we don’t have to worry about
voter machines, or long lines that dis-
courage people from voting.”
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AUGUST 3, 2007
