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I'm thinking that some serious attention needs to be paid to this book. Cause our perception of American democracy is really out of touc with the historyThe Right to Vote: The Contested History of Democracy in the United States



In the meantime, from firedoglake: I don't want everybody to vote
Paul Weyrich - "I don't want everybody to vote" (Goo Goo) 1980

"Now many of our Christians have what I call the goo-goo syndrome — good government. They want everybody to vote. I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of people, they never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down."

Judging from big media's slobbering acceptance of right wing attacks on ACORN's voter registration efforts, it remains a far greater sin in America to be suspected of voter registration misdeeds than to forcibly and publicly, through deception and armed muscle, keep a registered citizen from voting. Why is this?
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So-called registration fraud has yet to lead to charges of any fraudulent voting. So, with voter suppression there are visible crimes. On the other side, there are vague suspicions leveled at the usual suspects in America: the poor and people of color. The latter makes the headlines, even when there's plenty of reason to suspect the suspicious. ACORN, it should be remembered, is the group New Mexico prosecutor David Iglesias refused to investigate on orders from Karl Rove and President Bush. He was fired by them for following the law.

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Still, something's missing in the analysis. We're ready to jail the pickpocket. But if we're wired to be on the lookout for the bad, in a democracy the vote suppressor ought to be the baddest of the bad. But he escapes without even a metaphorical slap on the wrist.

Americans are proud of our experiment in democracy, proud to the point of investing its heroes, great moments and, as Sarah Palin says, its "exceptionalism," with a religiosity usually reserved for saints and holy places.

So it seems quite heretical that we would invent speed bumps, leashes for children and talking toasters before we've come close to achieving a voting system that safeguards everyone's right to vote and makes sure every vote is counted.

But right from the beginning, American democracy excluded many. The franchise was denied slaves, freed slaves, women, the property-less. The unworthy (at least those not kept outside in chains) are treated like Protestants who've stumbled into a Catholic mass. They can, sometimes, stay and sit quietly, but they can't participate in the sacraments.

This is the ugly truth. Many Americans believe, consciously or unconsciously, that there are others who should be denied the vote. They might quibble over who they are, but the practice of exclusion and suppression is not looked upon as something innately bad.

The denial of the right to vote is an accepted ritual practice in our democracy, which means we really haven't achieved democracy at all. If there is any single act that is central to the health of democracy, it is the vote.

Without that, elections are little more than weight-lifting contests. Those with the muscle to keep their political enemies from the polls will win. Sometimes, of course, a vote suppressor will lose because he just has too many political enemies to excommunicate. But even this can lead to a dangerous apathy. The press will justify its shrugging acceptance of voter suppression campaigns by pointing out that they don't always succeed.

But the press is the willing handmaiden of anti-democratic forces when it plays up "voter fraud" stories knowing in advance that the stories themselves carry an intimidation factor. Citizens whose communities have long been targets of law enforcement excesses have learned to steer clear of the suspected fraud of others. Voting, they fear after reading the stories, will lead them into the long arms of the law, even if they are legally registered, informed and caring citizens.MORE