Political Quotes

“I am proud to introduce the Voter Advocate and Democracy Index Act of 2007 with the goal of having the Act help inform voters and State officials on how well their States are doing on a basic set of procedural standards for making polls accessible to voters and making the right to vote as easy to exercise as possible. The Act would establish an Office of the Voter Advocate within the Election Assistance Commission that would be charged with creating a Democracy Index. The Index would rank States according to a system of measurable, basic state election practices. With that information, States could identify weak spots in their process, and voters could push for better performance. The concept is based on a proposal that Yale Law School Professor Heather Gerken published this January in Legal Times. It focuses on issues that matter to all voters: How long did voters spend in line? How many ballots got discarded? How often did the balloting machinery break down? The Act would constitute an important first step toward improving the health of our democracy. We are all familiar with the problems that have recently plagued our elections: Long lines, lost ballots, voters improperly turned away from the polls. These are basic failures of process. Until we fix them, we run the risk in every election that we will once again experience the kind of chaos and uncertainty that paralyzed the Nation in 2000. We can do better. We must do better.”