Florida’s Elections Law (HB 1355): Who knew college students were collateral damage?
To Combat the nickname “Flori-duh”--Florida Election Reform Act of 2001:
The 2000 election was a catastrophic event that put Florida’s election process front and center. Because of the unpleasant aftermath of the 2000 election, Florida officially implemented early voting in 2004 as part of the post-2000 election reform (Florida Election Reform Act of 2001). To combat the nickname “Flori-duh”, which was being used by the media because of the 2000 election, Floridians expressed that they wanted election reform and the Florida State Legislature listened (McManus, 2003). The bill was overwhelmingly passed by the legislature (unanimous in the House and 38 Yeas and 2 Nays in the Senate). Reforms included: precinct-based voting technology, prohibit punch cards and other antiquated voting systems in Florida, provide $2 million dollars for the development and implementation of a statewide centralized voter registration database by June 2002, allow a voter whose name does not appear on the voter registration roll to vote a provisional ballot that will be counted if the voter is subsequently found to be properly registered to vote (McManus, 2003).
Those with ‘Some College’ Voting Percentages in Florida:
Since the 2004 election, when Florida implemented early voting, 60.8% of Floridians (those with ‘some college’) voted in the 2004 election, 25% in the 2006 election, 63.9% in 2008, and 29.6% in 2010. Fast-forward ten years, and the state legislature has now reduced early voting down from fourteen days to eight days in order to curb voter fraud. However, during the 2008 election, college students took advantage of the extra time to make it to the polls to vote in the presidential election (Somanader, 9 May 2011). How will reducing the time impact college students who attend a college far away from home?
Disenfranchising College Students:
So says Deidre Macnab, president of the League of Women Voters. According to Macnab, “HB 1355 will impact Florida’s university students in particular, along with other voters who move within Florida but outside their county. What is the point of this rule change, other than to disenfranchise the 1 in 6 citizens who move during any given year?” (Orlando Sentinel, 15 April 2011). HB 1355 affects college students in two ways: (1) if a student moves to a different county prior to Election Day, he cannot change his address at the polls like he previously could in the state. Instead, he can cast a provisional ballot, which according to Sharockman (2011) are only counted in highly contested elections. Thus, college students must travel home during the early voting period (now cut down to eight days from fourteen) to vote. What if they can’t make it home during that time period? They must then cast a provisional ballot, because their address is wrong on their license, reflecting not their college address, but their home address, even though their correct voter information is located in the statewide registry established after the 2000 election. Two, third party voter registration groups are now fined if they do not turn in voter registration forms within 48 hours of receiving them. They are also fined if there is incorrect information on the forms. Why would third party registration groups come onto college campus’ to register students to vote if they are going to be fined in information provided is incorrect or they do not get the forms back to the Supervisor of Elections on time?
HB 1355 and the United States Justice Department
Florida is one of nine states that must get federal clearance to make changes to its election code, if the changes affect racial, ethnic or language minorities. Two sections of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) of 1965 are pertinent—section 5 and section 203. Section 5 requires “proof that the proposed changes does not have the purpose and will not have the effect of denying or abridging the right to vote on account of race or color or membership in a language minority group” (The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, 2011). Section 203 requires “certain jurisdictions to provide bilingual language assistance to voters in communities where there is a high concentration of citizens who are limited English proficient and illiterate” (The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, 2011). Five of Florida’s 67 counties are directly affected by Section 5 of the VRA—Hillsborough, Monroe, Collier, Hardee, and Hendry, and the federal government’s Justice Department must approve any changes to the election code before these counties can implement the required changes.
Implications for Education
In 1998, an amendment was added to the Higher Education Act that requires all colleges and universities to make a good faith effort to provide voter registration forms to college students. This bill requires all individuals collecting voter registration forms, including student grassroots organizations on campus (e.g. College Democrats and College Republicans) to provide information on all of their volunteers. Additionally, they must obtain official, custom-made registration forms from the local Supervisor of Elections with the organizations name on the form. Any fines, for turning in registration forms after 48 hours, collected by the Supervisor of Elections will no longer go towards voter education in the state (UCF College Democrats, 2011). Starting in 2006, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI) conducted surveys to examine what Americans knew about civic literacy. In 2006, over 14,000 college students averaged a failing grade on the ISI Civic Literacy Test. In 2007, similar results emerged. In 2008, the ISI expanded to look at adult Americans, with and without college degrees. In that study, 71% of Americans failed the Civic Literacy test. Additionally, the NAEP Nation’s Report Card on Civics (2011) revealed that students are making progress in civics at grade four but not in grades eight or twelve. In fact, twelfth graders scored lower on the assessment in 2010 than in 2006. Therefore, essentially cutting voter education funds is detrimental to curbing this problem in the state and country. Instead of cutting funds for civic education, which includes voter education, we need to increase funding; it is clear that many Americans—high school students, college students, and non-college students lack fundamental knowledge of the American government system.
References
Florida Chapter 2011-40. Committee substitute for committee substitute for house bill no. 1355.
Florida Map. (2011). Florida. Retrieved from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Bastique/Florida.
H.R. 6. (1998). P.L. 105-244 Amendments to the higher education ac of 1965. Retrieved from http://www2.ed.gov/policy/highered/leg/hea98/HR6.pdf.
Intercollegiate Studies Institute. (2011). Enlightened citizenship: How civic knowledge trumps a college degree in promoting active civic engagement. Wilmington, DE: American Civic Literacy Program. Retrieved from http://www.americancivicliteracy.org/report/pdf/02-22-11/civic_literacy_report_11.pdf.
Newman, J. (2006, March). Voting rights in Florida 1982-2006: A report of renewthevra.org. Retrieved from http://www.aclufl.org/issues/voting_rights/FloridaVRA2.pdf.
Macnab, D. (2011, April 15). Jim crow tactics return to Florida. Retrieved from http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/orlando_opinionators/tag/hb-1355.
National Center for Education Statistics. (2011). The nation’s report card: Civics 2010. (NICES 2011-466). Washington, D.C.: Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved from http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/pdf/main2010/2011466.pdf.
Somanader, T. (2011, May 9). Florida gop passes radical overhaul of election law jeopardizing voting rights of elderly, military, students. Retrieved from http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/05/09/164865/florida-voter-law/.
UCF College Democrats. (2011, April 7). HB 1355 A Bill to Restrict Voter Turnout. Retrieved from http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/orlando_opinionators/2011/04/hb-1355-a-bill-to-restrict-voter-turnout.html.
