Voting

Karen and I got up at the buttcrack of dawn to vote today.  Somewhat surprisingly, there were around fifty people voting at that hour, with more people coming in as we left. 

I've always viewed voting to be a civic duty.  Given the freedoms we cherish and for which so many people have died protecting, it's an abrogation of a basic freedom to not vote.  Admittedly, I don't vote in every little municipal election, but I do vote in the quadrennial presidential elections and the mid-term elections.

I don't believe there's such a thing as throwing away one's vote unless no vote is cast.  That it's recognized beforehand that one's candidate doesn't stand a chance of winning the election is of no consequence. 

When one's lived abroad and seen what other cultures are like, it heightens the sense of freedom we enjoy in this country.  When scenes such as those from the Middle East are televised back here, with women finally getting to vote and almost gleefully holding up their fingers stained with ink to show that they've voted, it drives home both the sanctity and the obligation that is voting.

There are plenty of funny things that happen at election time.  Coming from a region where joking about voting early and voting often is met with a yawn, I'm well aware that irregularities can skew the system.  Seeing a Black Panther outside a polling place harkens back to poll taxes and literacy exams.  Votes should be cast without coercion or incentive.

That being said, I have no problem with attempts to verify the identity of voters.  I'm not sure that having a driver's license is the answer, because getting a driver's license doesn't require the same standard as getting a passport does, for example.  At the same time, many people either have no interest in getting a passport or can't afford one.  A national identification card is simply too un-American for me.  Biometric devices are probably cost-prohibitive as well.

Voting is as much a right as it is an obligation.  I also view it as a privilege in this society.  Too many men and women have died to safeguard this right for me to waste it by not voting.  So getting to the polling place at dawn is little hardship.

(c) 2012 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles