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“Ballot Selfies” Ban Ruled Unconstitutional
It is hard to tell who is being more silly here: New Hampshire, the First Circuit, or voters. It seems odd that New Hampshire would spend its precious legislative time worrying about whether voters are taking selfies in the polling booth. If there is any threat to the integrity of the electoral process, it is who is doing the voting, not what they are doing in the booth. Will New Hampshire next ban selfies in other public places? How about banning ones in poor taste, which might give the police too much to do.
On the other hand, it is also hard to believe that the First Amendment guarantees the right to take a selfie in a polling place. The core purpose of the First Amendment is to protect political speech. The court forgets that this means speech about politics, not speech that happens to take place in a political location. While New Hampshire here is being silly, it is possible to imagine more important protections for the ballot booth, so as to prevent the exertion of undue influence. What if voters wanted to live-stream their voting to prove to others that they voted the way that they had promised? What if they wanted to bring in third parties to witness their vote?
But the worst of all are the voters. Why are people taking selfies of themselves voting? Have Kim Kardashian and Justin Bieber succeeded in driving our culture to yet new lows?
Published in Culture, Law
I guess the courts ruled long ago that First Amendment also means “free expression” when it comes to art, music, and selfies. My gripe against selfies in the polling booth is that it takes time, and there are people waiting in line to exercise their right to vote. Is a right delayed a right denied?
The whole point of taking a picture with your ballot is to make a political statement. Even if that point is “Hooray for me! I voted in the sewer referendum.” But it’s not the place of the government to judge the value of the speech. It may be stupid, but “stupid” isn’t the same as harmful, and is not a reason to ban something.
This is also an example of a heavy handed government enforcing laws in a way they weren’t intended. The statute was meant to fight ballot fraud, not to keep idiots from taking ballot selfies.
You can’t have pictures of people voting. It may cause issues with the election rigging.
I feel like someone should at least acknowledge the point of these laws is to prevent paying for votes. The point of the ban is that if you cannot photograph your ballot, then you cannot present the photograph as proof you voted one way in order to receive a kickback. It’s not like this has never been done before in the US. Prior to the introduction of the Australian Ballot, vote-buying was the primary method of getting voters to support you. And hence, yes, the prevention of third parties from going into the voting booth, would make perfect sense as well.
I think you misspelled “presidential election” but an understandable mistake.
That would be bad. We can’t have the money that is used to buy elections ending up in citizens hands and not the political class’s pockets.
Yes.
I was going to say something like “At least they used their own money to buy votes. Now they use the taxpayers’ money.”
As always, well thought out and pithy prose from Mr Yoo.
Many thanks.
As rights must be rooted in the minds and hearts of citizens, a citizen imagining a new right may be positive.
I wonder what else may have driven the officials to make this odd complaint?
My older daughters had a civics teacher who bragged about taking $5 to vote 5-10 times for Jack Kennedy in Cook County. Glad the girls got insight into voting fraud, grown ups with weak values and how history gets written.
Not sure his vote was worth even 50 cents, let alone his conscience.
Agree, this is rather absurd on both sides. I probably come down in favor of the ban simply to keep the polling locations free of the relentless exhibitionism that pervades our current culture as well as to keep the stations running as smoothly and efficiently as possible. I suppose there is a tiny anti-fraud and/or vote selling argument in there but doesn’t strike me as particularly strong.
I would guess that the main motivation for anyone wanting to take a picture of their ballot is personal and a way to prove their virtues. This way, they can all scramble down to the coffee shop and share their picture with other like-minded folks and engage in collective back-patting.
Its more than that. It is to prevent intimidation in the voting booth. For example, union boss tells all his membership that they must vote Democrat ticket all the way, and bring a selfie of them and their ballot to prove they did. No selfie, no job.
It isn’t unprecedented, there was a day that the union leadership went in the booth with you to insure you voted ‘properly’.
The privacy of the voting booth is fundamental to a free and fair election, and selfies threaten that directly.
I agree with this. And deplore this type of speech. And I think selfies will settle down over time.
My biggest issue is that another voter might feel threatened by the camera.
Not a bad point, but don’t work there then. And bring suit.
With the news that the recent mall shooter, a Turkish non-citizen, had voted, illegally and easily, in three prior elections, a paranoid friend has suggested that everyone voting for Trump should photograph their ballot and send it to Trump. She says it could prove embarrassing in those precincts where they count “zero” votes for Trump, as happened with Romney.
How pervasive is voter fraud? The feds recently funded a study of whether teens eat junk food while smoking pot. Once that study is completed, perhaps we could look a little deeper at the fraud rumor I’ve heard about for 40 years?
You’re just asking for an audit.
With the enthusiastic complicity of the left.
To be fair, someone put Kardashian and Bieber in the public spotlight in the first place. They are more of a symptom or a result of the new lows than a cause.