Election Day has passed, and with it came both change and consistency. President Obama was re-elected for a second term, and political advertisements came to a long awaited end. Yet I find myself troubled by a specific moment that occurred to me on Election Day. When I approached the registration table, they didn’t ask for my voter registration card, but instead my driver ID. Why?
Every election season, we’re told by political leaders (and our parents virtually every day, to be honest) that our vote counts; that it’s our duty to go out and vote for something, that soldiers die every day for this freedom, and at least a dozen other statements to try and get voters out of their houses and into the booths. This is all perfectly understandable, but what isn’t understandable is the means by which we are told to vote.
In order to vote, we are required by law to get a voter’s registration card, a certificate of verification that proves we are the person we say we are. It is verified by using various forms of identification that includes a Social Security number, birth certificate, and photo ID. So why, then, do we have these laws and go through all this trouble for a piece of paper if voter volunteers won’t even bother to ask for it?
There are many arguments for why we should and shouldn’t have registration cards, such as no one bothering to ask for them in the first place or not all poor people being able to afford full state licenses. I personally believe that voter registration cards are essential, and that the hassle we go through to obtain them should be enough verification to prove who we are. Yet to have to continually visit my precinct center and hear a volunteer ask for a driver’s license rather than the registration card is both irritating and counterintuitive to their purpose.
For the moment this is a mild annoyance, but it may not be long before citizens are crying out all across the country in anger at not being able to vote even when they have the proper verification. Perhaps registration cards must be changed to include a picture id, or voter volunteers need to better instructed in what they ask for. But people must start questioning this decision to ignore our proof to vote. Because in the end, what’s the point of telling people to vote if they’re stopped at the door?