Democracy North Carolina

Most Citizens Are Not Voting in North Carolina

Young Adults More Likely to Be Binge Drinkers Than Voters

 

A new “Civic Participation Index for North Carolina” shows that only two out of five adults [40.8 percent] bother to vote in the typical state election.

The Index says that young North Carolinians age eighteen to twenty-five are half as likely to vote as their grandparents—and more likely to engage in binge drinking than participate in elections.

And it says more men own guns than cast ballots.

The Index also shows that nearly one million adult citizens are not even registered to vote in North Carolina, and almost 400,000 of them are between eighteen and twenty-five.

The Index is based on an analysis of state and federal data by the nonpartisan Democracy North Carolina. Most of the figures detail the state’s poor record of voter participation. For example, less than a third of adults voted in 2006, ranking North Carolina 47th out of fifty states.

The Index highlights one positive achievement for North Carolina: The use of “early voting” sites has become so popular that a record fifty-five percent of voting-age adults participated in the 2004 presidential election, the highest turnout rate in a century.

The fifty-five percent turnout ranked North Carolina 35th nationally, still in the bottom third of states, but a solid improvement from a 45th ranking in the 1984 presidential election.

The top five states in 2004 had turnout rates of sixty-seven to seventy-three percent of their voting-age adults.

Bob Hall, Democracy NC’s research director, pointed out that North Carolina boasted turnout rates of over seventy percent of eligible adults during the hotly contested elections of the post-Civil War, Reconstruction era, but those rates plummeted with the disenfranchisement of many black and poor white voters through the poll tax, literacy tests, and other Jim Crow practices.

In recent years, none of the states with high turnout rates have been in the South. “The statistics show that North Carolina is still suffering from the legacy of a Jim Crow mentality that pushes, or even forces, people away from participating in their own government,” said Hall.

“Civic education programs and practical reforms like early voting can reverse that pattern and gradually make an important difference,” he added.

Hall said one of the biggest problems depressing turnout is North Carolina’s requirement that people register twenty-five days before an election. “Young people and busy blue-collar workers don’t pay attention to the election until the final week or so, and by then it’s too late,” he said.

The Index points out that men have cast only forty-four percent of the votes in past two presidential elections, and 2.3 adults over age sixty-five vote for every adult under age twenty-five.

The lack of participation by nearly one million unregistered adults, particularly youth and male wage earners, retards “the development of democracy of, by and for the people,” Hall said.

Overall, the state’s average turnout in presidential elections from 1984 through 2004 was forty-eight percent, ranking North Carolina 43rd nationally, ahead of South Carolina and Georgia, but behind Virginia, Tennessee and Alabama.

The top three states with the best performance (Minnesota, Maine and Wisconsin) boasted an average turnout of sixty-four to sixty-eight percent over that twenty-year period.

All three of those states allow citizens to register and vote on Election Day. In fact, seven of the fourteen states the highest turnout rates have used Election Day registration for many years (MN, ME, WI, NH, ID, WY) or require no registration at all (ND).

A broad coalition in North Carolina is backing a bill, which passed the state House last week, to allow citizens to register and vote during the early voting period, but not on Election Day itself. The early voting period extends from nineteen days to three day before the Election Day.

The proposal requires new registrants to show identification, complete a registration application, swear under penalty of a felony that the address given is current and that they are a U.S. citizen, and then vote with a retrievable ballot. Verification of the information must begin within two business days. The process includes computerized checks for matches in databases of the State Board of Elections, Division of Motor Vehicles, and Social Security Administration, along with a non-forwarding mailing to the address.

In a letter to Rep. Deborah Ross, the lead sponsor of H-91, State Board of Elections executive director Gary Bartlett wrote, “Following the procedures described in this legislation, I believe we can preserve the security and integrity of the election process and provide additional access for citizens who miss the registration deadline.”

Opponents say the measure will promote fraud in elections without more safeguards.

During the House floor debate, one opposition leader said five of the seven states with Election Day registration require voters to first show a driver’s license or government-issued photo ID.

But Hall said that claim is not true. “I’m appalled that a legislator who says he’s concerned about fraud would make such a false statement. In fact, none of those seven states – not one – requires a government-issued photo ID as the only proof of identity in order to register and vote on the same day, and they suffer no more fraud than our state does now.”

 

Contact Octavia Rainey, coordinator of the NC Coalition for Same-Day Registration at 919-649-9515 or Lynice Williams, executive director of NC Fair Share, at 919-786-7474.

 

105 W. Main St., Carrboro, NC 27510 • 919-967-9942 • www.democracy-nc.org

Carolina Civic Voice

                             Spring 2007  Vol.  7, No 1