Why New York's Legislature's Plan to Computerize Our Electoral System Is Unconstitutional

[Wilms]

Why New York's Legislature's Plan to Computerize Our Electoral System Is Unconstitutional

by andi novick

August 7, 2008

For 231 years the success of New York's democratic electoral system has depended on the ability to see how our votes are counted. That transparency is essential to prevent opportunities for fraud, as well as to provide citizens with a rational basis to trust election results and be able to evaluate their government's performance in conducting their elections. We can see how our votes are counted in a lever-counted or hand-counted voting system. We cannot see how optical scanners or DREs are programmed to count our votes, thus concealing the very fraud we must be able to detect and deter.

Attempting to first verify the unreliable software-generated count by hand counting a small portion of the ballots after the election is over, after the press has declared the winner, and after the ballots are exposed to heightened opportunities for post-election ballot tampering has historically been understood to be the least secure way to conduct an election. In fact, post-election ballot tampering has always been seen as so difficult to protect against that since the founding of the State, New York has mandated the election results be reliable, verified, and completed on election night.

It is the exposure of our franchise to these unprotectable opportunities for fraud before, during and after the election, that renders the new electoral system created by New York's 2005 Legislature unconstitutional.

The People Have the Constitutionally Protected Right to Know How Their Votes Are Counted and to See that Fraud Is Prevented

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For Two Centuries New York's Laws Have Required an Accurate Completed Reliable Count on Election Night: The Days Following the Election Invite Heightened Opportunities for Ballot Tampering Thus Requiring Any Verification/Recount to Be Completed on Election Night

Since New York's founding, our laws have required that the vote counting be conducted in an observable secure manner, subjecting the count to public scrutiny in order to prevent opportunities for tampering. For this reason New York's Election Law requires that the official election results must be accurate and completed on election night and the results publicly "...declared without any bias arising from a knowledge of its effect upon the aggregate result, or from exposure to subsequent influences." McLaughlin v Ammenwerth, 197 NY 340 (Court of Appeals 1910).

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The computerized evidence produced by software is insufficient to demonstrate how we voted or to prove fraud because it can be undetectably altered. If the paper ballots are also altered in the days and weeks following the election, there is then no evidence of what really happened on election day. An election can be stolen and the people, bereft of sufficient or responsible evidence, will be powerless to challenge the theft in court. This represents the ultimate destruction of checks and balances secured by our constitution, exposing us to the loss of our constitutional rights without legal recourse.

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http://www.opednews.com/articles/Overview-Why-New-York-s-L-by-andi-novick-080807-73.html

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