Election Day has always given me a charge of excitement. I look forward to it like I do a big sporting event. We’re voting for city council, school board and several local tax issues here in Longmont, Colorado.
But, the election has been over for many of my friends and neighbors for more than two weeks. Like many places around the country we use mail voting for our elections. We receive our ballots in mid-October and can vote at our own convenience.
Election Day used to be Election Day. Now, it’s merely the last day of Election Fortnight (give or take a few days). I find the modern Election Day experience anticlimactic.
Election Day used to be a shared experience. Voters turned out, sipped coffee or hot chocolate, chatted with seldom seen neighbors and waited their turn to go behind the curtain (or to a cubicle) to cast their votes. Grade school gymnasiums, National Guard armories, church foyers became – for a day – the halls of democracy to which voters flocked. We always took our kids so they could witness the privileged act of voting.
On Election Day night, political rivals would often gather at the same venue for the chance to learn election results at the earliest possible moment. As a boy, I would go with my father to the county courthouse. Forty or fifty people, perhaps more, would stand outside the county clerk’s office waiting for tallies to be posted on the large blackboard set up in the hallway for the occasion. I have a vivid memory of two candidates for sheriff shaking hands after the victor became clear.
The communal aspects of Election Day are all but gone. Participating in the election process is one more thing we do in isolation from one another.
There is a lot to be said for Election Fortnight. A person doesn’t have to get up early to vote before going to work; slip away during the work day, or stand in line for the last minute rush before the polls close. Weather is no longer a concern. You can take your time filling out your ballot. There’s no pressure of holding up the line for everyone else. You can tune out political ads two weeks sooner. And, the county clerk doesn’t have to fret about a lack of volunteers to serve as polling place judges.
We don’t have to gather at the county courthouse or local newspaper to learn election results. The internet makes it possible to check vote tallies in our homes or with small groups at private venues. Political rivals can avoid each other altogether. There’s no need or occasion to shake hands after the votes are counted. Election Fortnight provides one more opportunity to avoid face-to-face political conflict.
I may be nostalgic for Election Days of old – I still walk my ballot to a branch office of the county clerk on Election Day. But, I’m not naïve. The trend toward personally convenient voting will continue. It’s only a matter of time and better encryption systems before we will cast our ballots on the internet.
The questions I think about are how do we replace what we’ve lost? What new shared experiences will we create to nurture our communities and our democracy? What occasions will we invent to bring rivals together after Election Day is past? How will we remind ourselves that voting is not just the tallying of individual preferences but a way to affirm that “we’re in it together?”
Community is a foundational element of democracy. As we strive to make all activities personally convenient, we must not lose sight of the need to nurture our communities, too.