VOTE!

Over the past two weeks I’ve been working full-time at an early voting office in Taylorsville, Utah. Some days we had as few as 55 voters, others as many as 133. Overall, 676 people exercised their right to vote at our location, and each time a voter returned a voting card, we handed him or her a red and white “I Voted” sticker. A few people declined to accept the sticker, but most accepted it gladly and promptly placed it to the upper left side of their chests where their hands might rest while reciting the pledge of allegiance. I saw it over and over again.

This made me think of the triumphant voters in liberated Iraq in 2005 who dipped their thumbs in insoluable purple ink to indicate that they had voted, a step designed to prevent them from voting again. Iraqis who dared to vote by the thousands defied threats of violent retaliation to turn out at the polls.

In some countries like Australia eligible citizens are required to vote. In Bolivia, if you don’t vote, the government can prevent you from accessing your bank account for up to three months.

But I’m not writing to lament the low turnout in this municipal election. I don’t want people to use the eeny, meeny, miny, moe method of selecting a candidate to fulfill a civic obligation to vote. I prefer voluntary voting by people who have formulated an opinion, regardless of how they arrived at it.

My co-worker observed that voters tend to be extremely nice people. Maybe that’s why they go out of their way to vote.

On the next to last day of voting, one woman who had forgotten to get a sticker came by later to pick one up. She indicated that she had some sort of grievance with one of the candidates for mayor and wanted that person to see that she had cast a ballot.

Which made me realize that the “I Voted” stickers might just as easily read “I Exercised My Power As a Citizen.”

I would encourage everyone who can vote to study the issues and the candidates and vote, not only because it is a person’s civic duty to do so, but also because it’s a uniquely empowering experience.