On Election Day, Connecticut ballots will include an important question in addition to the usual Federal and State races. The ballots will ask voters to vote “Yes” or “No” on the following:
“Shall the Constitution of the State be amended to permit the General Assembly to provide for early voting?”
Connecticut is one of just a handful of states which does not currently offer early voting. There was a similar referendum question on the ballot in 2014 which was voted down. When assessing if early voting is right for Connecticut, it is worth considering how voting works here. In Connecticut, elections are run by each of our 169 municipalities – towns like New Canaan. Polling places are set up and overseen Registrars of Voters, part-time officials who already work very hard to make sure our single-day elections run smoothly. Absentee Ballots are managed by Town Clerks who also have lots of unrelated responsibilities as well. This decentralized system is fundamentally different than most other states which organize their election infrastructure around counties. Delaware, another small state which currently offers Absentee Voting, offers just 4 polling places for early voting statewide. While we see the obvious value in improving access to the polls, this open-ended referendum question should viewed with some skepticism. Here are some of our concerns:
Open-Ended Authority – The referendum proposes allowing Early Voting without providing any boundaries or limitations. The State legislature can adopt a law mandating any early voting period by a simple majority vote. Do we want 46 days of early voting like they have in Minnesota? Can we afford to staff voting sites in every town for weeks? Probably not, but once you vote “yes” on the referendum question, the details are out of the voter’s hands. For voters voting “Yes” on the ballot question, it will be “In the Connecticut State Legislature we trust …”
Unfunded Mandate – Massachusetts passed a law in 2014 that allowed 14 days of early voting. Like Connecticut, Massachusetts’ elections are run locally and the cities and towns have battled the state over costs every election cycle since the law went into effect. In 2017, the state auditor ruled that early voting was an unfunded mandate, but election funding has still not been permanently included in the state’s budget. Reduced Voter Engagement – In Connecticut, we hold our primaries in mid-August. If early voting starts in mid-October, campaigns will have just 2 months to reach voters before votes are cast. It also allows little time for candidates to be vetted by the press and opposing candidates. In most early-voting states, voters are not permitted to change their vote once an early vote has been cast.