Voting should be easy, convenient and efficient — no lines, and no panic about choosing between voting or being late to work.
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With that in mind, the Brennan Center for Justice recommends that New York and other states with outdated election schedules provide for a two-week voting period instead of cramming it all into one day. At least 32 states and the District of Columbia offer some form of early voting, and apparently voters like it a lot. As one former Nevada election official told the Brennan Center analysts, "Early voters are happy voters, and Election Day voters are grumpy voters."
The center's survey found that early voting also means shorter lines, better performance by poll workers and more time to fix broken machines or other problems.
Not all lawmakers are eager to expand their electorate. When Barack Obama ran for president in 2008, minority voters in Florida took advantage of the state's early voting and flocked to the polls. Many cast their ballots on Sunday after church — "Souls to the Polls," as Floridians called it. But shortly before the 2012 election, Florida's Republican legislators cut the number of days and hours almost in half. The long lines that resulted on Election Day finally shamed the Legislature into allowing local election officials to add extra days in future elections.
Many of the states that have encouraged early voting are in the West and South. The laggards are in the Northeast, with New York now the largest state without any early in-person voting. New York's Assembly passed an early-voting bill this year, but it stalled in the State Senate. New Jersey's Legislature also passed an early-voting bill; Gov. Chris Christie vetoed it.
It is well past time for lawmakers in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and other states with antiquated one-day voting to make this essential civic duty a lot easier to meet than it is now.
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