[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 6]
[House]
[Pages 8313-8321]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



            COMPREHENSIVE ELECTION REFORM LEGISLATION NEEDED

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2001, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I rise to open a discussion on election 
reform.
  Mr. Speaker and colleagues, as chair of the Democratic Caucus Special 
Committee on Election Reform, I stand before Congress today to urge 
this body to respond to the unrelenting public outcry for comprehensive 
election reform legislation.
  Election reform is an issue that transcends all partisan politics. 
The right to vote is the very cornerstone of our democracy. Earlier 
this year I was honored to be appointed by the gentleman from Missouri 
(Mr. Gephardt) House minority leader, to chair the U.S. House of 
Representatives Democratic Caucus Special Committee on Election Reform. 
I am very pleased to be joined on that committee by a prestigious group 
of representatives, including the ranking members of the Committee on 
House Administration and the Committee on the Judiciary. As a matter of 
fact, many of those on that committee may serve as speakers here today.
  The goal of our committee is to ensure the integrity of the election 
process while increasing voter confidence

[[Page 8314]]

and participation. While the Florida experience is still fresh in our 
mind, this committee has begun a thorough review of nationwide voting 
practices and election laws in an effort to restore the confidence of 
the American people.
  We anticipate that our committee will propose legislation designed to 
serve our goals, identify key areas where uniform national standards 
may be appropriate, and make recommendations to Congress on the 
implementation of changes at the State and local levels.
  On April 2, 2001, we held our first hearing in Philadelphia, the 
cradle of American democracy, and we learned firsthand from 
Philadelphia voters that when their names were not found on precinct 
rosters, they were forced to have to travel to police stations to see a 
judge to determine if they could vote.
  Many voters confronted with this form of provisional voting ended up 
not voting at all, because they were intimidated by the idea of having 
to go to a police station or because it was just a logistical 
nightmare.
  At our second hearing in San Antonio, Texas on April 20, we heard 
testimony from registered voter Mrs. Carmen Martinez who was denied her 
right to vote in the November elections because her name had been 
erroneously purged from state voter polls. The Texas Secretary of State 
who also testified explained that Texas' practice of purging voter 
rolls resulted in 750,000 voters removed from the polls last year. In 
Texas names are purged from voter rolls as a result of confirmation 
notices mailed by county registrars which are returned as undeliverable 
or indicating a return of address.
  However, Mrs. Martinez explained that she had never lived at any 
other address since the day she registered to vote.
  On Saturday our committee will travel to Chicago, Illinois, where 
more ballots were discarded in the last election than in any other 
major city in the country. A hand-examination of the 123,000 discarded 
ballots found that the number one reason for the uncounted ballots was 
faulty ballot punches.
  We recognize that in many States they are indeed in the process of 
approving reforms to their election systems. Most of these reforms 
relate to modernizing outdated voting equipment and machinery. The 
committee applauds these efforts to upgrade from punch card or lever 
voting systems to touch screen or optical scan systems, and we support 
these reforms.

                              {time}  1500

  But technological advances in voting equipment alone will not solve 
all of the problems of our electoral process. The committee intends to 
thoroughly examine issues relating to poll worker recruitment and 
training, national holidays or time off for voting, uniform voting 
standards, absentee voting, and standardized recount and vote 
certification procedures. Particular attention needs to be focused on 
issues relating to voter disenfranchisement, like the purging of voter 
rolls, voter identification requirements, provisional balloting, voter 
education, ballot design, sensitivity to poorly educated voters, and 
voters with disabilities, voting rights and voter intimidation issues. 
These issues have a disproportionate effect on voters in minority 
communities. We are monitoring civil rights lawsuits that have been 
filed in California, Florida, Illinois and St. Louis among others 
involving many of these issues.
  Equally important is the disenfranchisement of overseas military 
personnel. Congress is uniquely situated to implement uniform standards 
to ensure that American men and women serving overseas have their 
voices heard in our elections. Similar reforms must be adopted for 
other U.S. citizens living abroad. Congress must indeed take the lead 
role in restoring voter confidence in our election system and 
increasing voter participation.
  Given the resources available to Congress and the studies being 
developed by other organizations and commissions, Congress is in the 
best position to identify key areas where uniform, national standards 
may very well be appropriate. We need to pass legislation and propose 
recommendations for changes at the State and local levels to ensure 
that every vote is indeed counted. As chair of this committee, I will 
do everything in my power to see that we accomplish these goals on 
behalf of the American people.
  Mr. Speaker, I know that just as I and the Members who serve on this 
committee are concerned about voter reform, we have members in the 
Senate who are very much concerned and they too are working, holding 
hearings and putting together legislation. Just this morning, the 
Congressional Black Caucus met with many members of the United States 
Senate. At that meeting, we heard from Senator Dodd about legislation 
that he is proposing. We also heard more about the legislation that is 
being proposed by the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers). And we 
know that we have many other Members, even some of the Members who 
serve on our special committee, such as the gentleman from Maryland 
(Mr. Hoyer) and the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Price) and also 
the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky), all who have introduced 
legislation. So we have many pieces of legislation that are being 
introduced. I think our committee will be able to examine this 
legislation and we will be able to give input and recommendation to 
those who will end up being the final persons who will present 
legislation, both in this body and in the other body, to come up with 
legislation that can indeed carry us into election reform.
  We are concerned, however. There is no money in the budget for 
election reform. And we are surprised about that. We had talked at 
length to representatives of this administration about election reform 
and we had been told that it was important to the President and that it 
was important to even the Republican Conference. But we have not been 
able to get any commitments for the resources that are necessary to 
help some of these jurisdictions who have little or no money to deal 
with just the simple problems of replacing punch card systems and 
getting rid of machines that do not work.
  We will continue to try to encourage the President and Members on the 
other side of the aisle to get involved in this issue, to help us get 
the resources that we need in order to make reform a reality.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. 
Schakowsky) to share with us the important work that she is doing on 
provisional balloting in the election process.
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. I thank the gentlewoman from California not only for 
yielding but for her steadfast leadership on this very important issue 
of election reform. As chairperson of the Democratic Caucus Special 
Committee on Election Reform, she is working to ensure that citizens 
across the Nation are aware of the serious effort that is going on to 
reform our system and guaranteeing that in the future, no eligible 
voter will ever be turned away again, shut out or discriminated against 
on election day.
  This Saturday, the committee will hold its next hearing in Chicago. 
Hundreds of voters will have the opportunity to tell us their 
experiences about how we can improve the system. Chicago, a large part 
of which I have in my district, had the most error-ridden Presidential 
election last fall of any major U.S. city, with 123,000 uncounted 
ballots in Cook County.
  That is why the work of this committee is so important. We can learn 
from voters across the country and from local election officials and 
experts how we can reform our election system. What the 2000 election 
has taught us is that many problems exist and that without serious 
Federal legislative steps, we are destined for another Florida fiasco 
with the election decided by the judicial branch and not the 
electorate.
  Florida could have happened anywhere. As it turns out, it certainly 
could have happened in Chicago given all the problems that we had. On 
election day around the country, voters were turned away from the 
polling place. They were unfairly targeted. They were not allowed to 
fully exercise

[[Page 8315]]

their constitutional right during the election.
  This past election taught us a very important lesson. Voters were 
penalized for no fault of their own. That is why I believe, as I 
believe the gentlewoman does, that Congress can play a role in 
reforming current law. One of the ways that it can do it is with 
provisional voting legislation. It is important that one standard exist 
nationwide that would guarantee that no registered voter is turned away 
at the polls.
  When we talk about national involvement in elections, which is 
largely a matter of local jurisdictions, we are not talking about 
muddling in their business. What we are talking about is setting 
standards that will guarantee the right of every citizen and the 
details left to the local jurisdiction. But this provisional voting 
issue is one where we can play a role in setting the standard. Passing 
legislation like, for example, my Provisional Voting Rights Act of 
2001, H.R. 1004, registered voters can feel confident if their name 
does not appear on the registration list, they will be permitted to 
vote. They would not have to go, as they do in some places, we heard in 
Philadelphia, to a police station, or leaving the polling place in 
order to get their provisional ballot.
  During the committee's hearing in Philadelphia, we heard testimony 
from Juan Ramos, founder of the Delaware Valley Voter Registration 
Education Project and Petricio Morales, an ordinary voter, who 
testified that voters had to travel to the police station to see a 
judge to determine whether they are eligible to vote. Voters then had 
to travel all the way back to the polling place to cast their vote. 
Many voters who are confronted with that process either decide not to 
vote because they feel intimidated or because of time constraints or 
just plain inconvenience.
  In Cook County, if your name does not appear in the right place, then 
you are just simply prohibited from voting altogether. You can vote by 
affidavit under certain limited conditions but there are many instances 
where even though you may be a registered voter, you cannot vote on 
election day.
  We have to change that. Voters should be given a provisional ballot 
after affirming their right before an election official right there at 
the polling place. They can vote immediately and feel confident that if 
it is certified that day that they are eligible, that that vote will 
count. If our goal is to ensure that more voter participation occurs, 
we should take steps to ensure that this is achieved. And reforming 
provisional voting is a step in that direction.
  Actually in the legislation that I have, if they cannot show that 
this person is not eligible to vote, then the person would be able to 
vote, exercising their right as a citizen of the United States. I am 
certain that we will hear more during our committee's hearings in 
Chicago on Saturday and across the country as the committee continues 
to highlight the importance of election reform in subsequent hearings. 
I look forward to that. I once again congratulate my colleague from 
California on a job well done.
  Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I sincerely thank the gentlewoman from 
Chicago for all of the work that she has done on election reform. She 
has been at every meeting. She has traveled with us both to Texas and 
to Pennsylvania and, of course, she is hosting us in Chicago this 
weekend. She is giving priority time to this issue. And it is because 
of the kind of work that she is doing, we are going to be able to help 
set some standards on issues such as provisional balloting.
  Now it is my great pleasure to yield to the gentleman from North 
Carolina to deal with the bill and some issues that he has been working 
with on election reform. I thank him for all of the time and attention 
that he has given to us as we have tried to put together this committee 
and gather the information that we need to make the recommendations to 
this House.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. I thank my colleague for yielding. I 
want to underscore what others have said, that the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Waters) has done a wonderful job in pulling this 
committee together and in taking us all over the country to examine 
voting practices and possible reforms in various communities. I think 
we are going to have some very significant results in a relatively 
short period of time.
  Everyone in the country, of course, knows about the travesty that 
occurred in Florida last fall. But what we have learned is that 
unfortunately, it is not that unusual for people to have their votes 
not counted accurately, to find that somehow their name has 
mysteriously dropped off the rolls when they go to vote on election 
day. There is a range of problems and challenges that we need to deal 
with to make our democracy work as it needs to work. Certainly the 
right to vote and to have your vote counted is fundamental to 
democracy.
  My particular focus today is going to be on voting equipment, because 
we know that we need modern equipment to have votes cast accurately and 
counted accurately and unfortunately there is a great disparity in this 
country in the kind of equipment that people are using and the kind of 
equipment that local communities have access to. All too often, there 
is a correlation between the worst, worn-out, inaccurate equipment and 
the economic level of that neighborhood and that precinct and that 
community.
  That simply is unacceptable. It is unacceptable for any community to 
have worn-out, inaccurate equipment but particularly for it to be 
concentrated in lower-income areas, minority areas, that is just simply 
unacceptable. We should not stand for it for another election. Before 
the 2002 election occurs, we must move on this problem.
  It is sort of like the situation we face when we find a neighborhood 
built on top of a toxic waste dump. How do we respond? We respond to 
that emergency by buying out those homes to protect the people who live 
there. When a flood wipes out a community like happened in eastern 
North Carolina not too long ago, we respond by buying out property to 
protect the residents and help them find safe places to live.

                              {time}  1515

  Well, I think error-prone voting equipment is no less an emergency. 
It is an emergency that threatens our democracy, and we need an 
immediate response. And it is going to take some money. It is going to 
take some money to upgrade voting technology from error-prone punch-
card systems to reliable machines. But we cannot afford not to do 
anything, and here too I think a buyout is warranted, a buyout of these 
machines, so that new, accurate machines can be in place by the 2002 
election.
  Just look at what error-prone voting machinery does to our democracy. 
It is impossible to say every vote counts, when a study done by Caltech 
and MIT revealed that the spoilage rate for punch cards from 1988 to 
2000 was 2.9 percent, or as many as 986,000 votes in the year 2000 
alone.
  In Florida last year, the spoilage rate for punch cards was 3.9 
percent. In Fulton County, Georgia, the punch-card spoilage rate 
reached 6.25 percent. In Cook County, Illinois, it was 5 percent during 
the last election. That amounts to 120,000 ballots.
  Now, we have seen some encouraging efforts in cities and counties and 
States to get rid of this error-prone equipment. In 1996, the City of 
Detroit used punch-card machines and 3.1 percent of its ballots were 
spoiled. In 2000, after the city moved to an optical scan system, which 
warns voters of errors and allows them to correct mistakes, the rate 
fell to 1.1 percent.
  In the States, Georgia recently passed legislation requiring uniform 
election equipment throughout the State by 2004, and the State is going 
to conduct a pilot project to test electronic touch screen voting 
equipment in the 2001 municipal elections.
  Maryland passed legislation to require the State Board of Elections 
to select and certify a new voting system to be used by all counties in 
the State. And, as we have recently heard, in Florida, the legislature 
passed sweeping election reform, including $24 million for new voting 
systems. Florida

[[Page 8316]]

has banned punch-card machines, thank goodness, and it requires 
counties now to use electronic or precinct-based optical scan equipment 
in the 2002 elections.
  Perhaps I ought to point out in discussing the possible avenues for 
reform that we are not necessarily finding that high-tech is always 
better. In fact, some of the answers to our problems might be described 
as low-tech.
  For example, these precinct-based optical scan machines which have 
been turned to in so many areas are not as complex or advanced or 
certainly as expensive as touch screen machines or proposed Internet 
voting. But the fundamental question is not how fancy or how expensive 
or how complicated the machinery is, but rather does it work? Does it 
enable you to cast your vote in a straightforward way, and does it 
count that vote accurately? There may be many different technologies 
that lend themselves to our reform efforts.
  The U.S. election system comprises 200,000 polling places, 7,000 
jurisdictions, 1.4 million poll workers and 700,000 voting machines, so 
it is not a simple system and there are not simple solutions. But 
Congress needs to be an active and constructive partner if we are going 
to have a successful and meaningful election reform, and there is no 
better time to act than now.
  There are several proposals in the Congress to help States and 
counties and cities get the technology they need to run accurate 
elections. A bill I introduced with the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. 
Hoyer) and the gentleman from California (Mr. Horn) would make grants 
available to any jurisdiction that used a punch-card voting system in 
the last election. We want to see them get new equipment in place by 
2002, and we are going to push for Federal funding to make that buyout 
happen, to get those inaccurate, worn-out machines off line and bring 
on more accurate systems.
  I am disappointed that the President and our Republican friends have 
failed to include one dollar for election reform in their budget, but 
that must not stop us. This Congress must meet the challenge of 
restoring faith in our democracy.
  I thank my colleague from California for her leadership in making 
this happen, and I pledge my continued support, my continued work, to 
make meaningful election reform a front-burner item before even the 
first session of this Congress goes home.
  Ms. WATERS. I thank the gentleman from North Carolina for all of the 
time and attention he has given to the efforts of this committee. It is 
because of his diligent work and his efforts that we are going to be 
successful in helping to reform the election systems of this country.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gonzalez).
  Mr. GONZALEZ. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from California and 
join everyone that preceded me in praise of her efforts and the 
leadership that she has demonstrated in making sure that this committee 
meets its charge.
  Mr. Speaker, if one thinks in terms of the greatest and most precious 
right that any American citizen would have, and that is the right to 
vote, it is the great equalizer. One vote counts just as much as any 
other. The vote of the President of the United States is no more 
important and is given no more weight than the vote of someone who is 
18 years old and happens to be a senior in high school and casting 
their vote for the first time. It empowers us. It empowers the people 
of the greatest democracy known in all of history, and therein lies our 
problem, and that is the exercise of that right.
  Now, we all know that we have laws at the State and Federal level 
that protect the right to vote. It guarantees the right to vote. We 
have the Constitution of the United States, the Supreme Court of the 
land, that, again, will guarantee us the right to vote. But it is only 
guaranteeing the right to vote.
  What thwarts, what frustrates, what impedes the citizen's right to 
vote, regardless of the constitutional guarantee or the laws that we 
have on the books? Well, believe it or not, it is something as simple 
as a machine that malfunctions, something a little more complicated by 
not keeping an accurate voter list.
  In the past though, and this is so important, and I think we are 
forgetting the lessons that history should have taught us, when I was 
growing up in the State of Texas the greatest evil to the right to vote 
was the poll tax. It kept people from being able to exercise that 
precious right. The poll tax at one time was about $1. It went up to 
about $2. My father, who served in this Chamber for 37 years, the first 
bill he introduced upon being sworn in was to abolish the poll tax, and 
eventually it was.
  But then there was something else, literacy tests. Anything that 
could keep the citizens of the United States from exercising their 
right to vote.
  Well, we have made great progress. We do not have literacy tests any 
more, we do not have the poll tax any more. But what comes in its place 
today? Either through intention or through neglect, other things are 
now posing as great a risk to the disenfranchisement of the citizens as 
in the past, where once, because of gender or color, people were denied 
the right to vote, and once, because they did not have the amount of 
dollars to pay for the poll tax or could not pass some made up literacy 
test, were denied the right to vote. That was a travesty, as I said, 
and we corrected it.
  But we are back there. That is the tragedy of what was demonstrated 
in Florida, is that we may still be there. It is more subtle. Like I 
said, maybe it is by some intentional act, or it could be simply by 
negligence.
  What do I mean by that? Well, today we have voting equipment that 
simply does not work. I mean, it simply does not work. It does not do 
its intended job.
  We have inaccurate voter lists, so that when people go to vote, they 
are not on the list and they are denied the right to vote, even though 
they truly are registered. Because of some mistake, lack of funds, 
technology, they are just not on the list.
  Confusing ballot design. There are many. I will tell you right now, 
if you look at certain ballots, you will be confused. I know that when 
I go to vote, I assume it is going to be somewhat of a simple ballot. I 
hate to admit, but in a recent City Council election in San Antonio, 
when I went to vote earlier, I looked at that thing and I was too 
embarrassed to ask for instructions. A lot of people feel that way. I 
think I was more embarrassed than the average citizen, because I am a 
Member of Congress. But the point is, if I felt somewhat intimidated, 
if I was confused, think of the average citizen going to the polling 
place.
  In Texas, we do have provisional ballots in voting. If your name is 
not on the list, you might be able to swear, if you have an educated, 
trained, skilled poll worker that knows the law. However, that is 
denied many voters, because we do not have trained and educated poll 
workers. They are not paid enough, they are not trained, they are not 
educated in the election law, that which they are there to administer.
  It sounds outrageous, but there is no one right now that can hear my 
voice, no matter where you live, that is not experiencing this problem. 
You just do not know about it. You have not looked into it.
  That is what this committee is doing. We are going throughout the 
United States and holding hearings in different locations, 
Philadelphia, San Antonio; it will be Chicago next. And what are we 
learning? We are learning quite a bit.
  I will tell you what I learned in San Antonio, my own backyard. We 
have the problems as Florida. We have overvotes. We never knew that 
they were invalidating individuals' votes until we looked at it in the 
context of the Florida experience. And then I have got my election 
officials saying, well, Congressman, this is nothing new. We always 
have these votes. We just toss them out. They do not count.
  See, you have to ask yourself, why do we have these? It might be 
ballot design or the equipment itself, improper instruction, the lack 
of voter education. Again, the polling worker in San Antonio, I found 
out in a city where you have more than 60 percent

[[Page 8317]]

Hispanic population that we did not have bilingual poll workers in many 
of those parts of the community, where it is not 60 percent Hispanic, 
it is 85 and 90 percent Hispanic. So it is my own backyard. And I am 
willing to admit to it, that out of ignorance, I never got involved. 
Out of ignorance, I never did anything.
  The tragedy of Florida is not what happened in Florida. In and of 
itself, it is a tragedy. The real tragedy is if we do not learn a 
lesson and do something.
  So this committee is going to do something. We are going to identify 
the problems. We are going to make recommendations. We will come up 
with legislation that will address many of these problems.
  But do not get us wrong. Part of our job is to be a clearinghouse for 
not just the problems, but for the ideas and the solutions and the 
remedies. And we will look to the States and the local authorities to 
come up with their own solutions, those that custom fit their 
particular problem. We want to give the States and the localities that 
opportunity, because that is what we do here in Congress.
  We do not want a Federal fix for every problem. However, if action is 
not taken that addresses the inequities and the injustices of people 
not being able to vote, then it is our duty, as Federal officials, to 
step in and not only give direction, but basically do it on our own.
  I do not think it will come to that. I think we will make certain 
suggestions. Many States and localities are already incorporating and 
enacting laws. If there is a shortcoming, we will say, how can we help?
  You have already heard one of my colleagues. We have legislation, it 
has already been introduced, about assisting localities in the purchase 
of the latest technology, which is really important. But they will make 
the decision on what best suits their situation. But we are there to 
help.
  It is so important. I guess there is no way to explain it. How can we 
guarantee the right to vote to the citizen? How can we teach the 
children in our classrooms how great our country is, and then we say, 
voter participation is decreasing. Get out there and vote. Every year, 
every election, I am out there with some sort of public service 
announcement, begging my constituents to please get out there, to 
register and vote.
  Now they are going to take me up on that. They go and attempt to 
exercise that right, and they are not able to. Therein lies the real 
problem. I do not think the problem is that we do not have enough laws 
guaranteeing the right, we just do not have the mechanism to translate 
the right into reality, and that is our charge.
  Madam Chairman, I think I am going to end where I started. I am going 
to thank you for the leadership you provided us. It is a great honor to 
serve on this committee, and I think many, many people are going to be 
quite impressed with the end product.
  We have heard that this is not an issue that is way at the top of the 
list as far as the American public or the United States Congress is 
concerned, and that is wrong, because then what we have done is we have 
compounded the tragedy of Florida. We did not learn a lesson, we did 
not make a situation better, we did not cure a problem.

                              {time}  1530

  Should we fail to do that, I think we have failed in our duty and 
responsibility; but more importantly, we have failed the American 
people. They have a right to vote, but they also have a right to make 
sure that that vote is counted. What good is a right if one cannot 
exercise it.
  Again, I thank the gentlewoman very much.
  Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the gentleman from 
Texas, not only for his participation here today, but for his 
participation on this very special committee. He has been at every 
meeting, and I want my colleagues to know that he rolled out the red 
carpet for us in San Antonio where we had an excellent hearing and we 
learned an awful lot about purging and had testimony from Mrs. Carmen 
Martinez, who told us about what happened to her there.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield to the gentleman from Maryland as 
much time as he may consume. While the gentleman is coming to the 
microphone, I would like to say that we are so happy to have him on 
this committee. He has contributed tremendously to our work already; 
not only has he been involved with us as we have traveled, but he has 
been to all of the meetings that we hold every Tuesday, and he has been 
working very hard, trying to bridge the gap between this side of the 
aisle and that side of the aisle, to come up with legislation that will 
move us forward in reform. I thank the gentleman so very much for all 
that he has done.
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her comments. I 
want to also thank her for the extraordinary efforts that she is making 
to ensure that not only in America will every citizen have the right to 
vote and be welcomed and encouraged in exercising that right, but will 
also have his vote counted correctly.
  When the minority leader, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), 
was discussing who should chair a committee that would look at election 
reforms, the problems that were brought to light in the last election, 
we had some discussions. He suggested the gentlewoman from California 
(Ms. Waters), and the reason he did so is because he knew and I knew 
and her colleagues knew that the gentlewoman is one of the strongest, 
most courageous voices that we have on this floor, a voice much like 
the voice of the gentleman from Texas's father who, in his time, was a 
giant in speaking out for those who were disenfranchised by operation 
of law. No less should we speak out for those who might be 
disenfranchised by either negligence or the misoperation of technology.
  So I thank the gentlewoman for her leadership, for her hard work on 
this effort; and I am confident that we are going to pass legislation 
in this Congress. This is the civil rights issue of the 107th Congress. 
There is no more basic right in democracy than the right to vote. When 
we do pass legislation, it will be largely attributable to her hard 
work and efforts in making sure that everybody in the Nation is focused 
on this issue.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to speak for a few minutes on one element that is 
key to reform: better voting technologies, the nuts and bolts of the 
election infrastructure. Now, as I begin this, I want to make it again 
clear that the technology issue comes in only after we have ensured and 
facilitated a voter getting to the technology. If the voter never gets 
to the technology, it is irrelevant.
  So the most important thing we need to make sure of is that every 
voter is able to register; that they have their registration accurately 
recorded; that it is transmitted accurately to a polling place; that 
the election officials receive the voter and accurately check to make 
sure that voter is registered; and that there is, if there is a failure 
to communicate from the recipient of the registration and the polling 
place, a way in which a provisional ballot can be cast, so that that 
voter is not turned away, is not told no, your democracy is not open to 
you today, not because of your failure, but because we failed to 
transmit information properly. So what we are going to do is allow you 
to vote and then we will take a day or two to make sure that you, as 
you have said, were registered to vote and a legal voter.
  None of us on this floor wants to facilitate voting by people who are 
not eligible to vote. But equally, I hope, there is nobody on this 
floor who wants to prevent an eligible voter from casting a vote. We 
found in Florida that people who got to the polls voted, thought they 
had voted correctly, left, and found that, lo and behold, their votes 
were not counted. We further found that this was not a Florida problem. 
It was Florida that we focused on, it was Florida that we learned from, 
but we quickly were informed by others around the country that it was 
not a Florida problem.
  It was a problem in jurisdictions north, east, south and west, in 
Maryland, in California, in Texas, and New

[[Page 8318]]

Jersey, the four jurisdictions represented on the floor right now. So 
we focused on the fact that we need to make sure that that voter, when 
they exercise their franchise, has it counted and has it counted 
accurately. Better voting technology is the nuts and bolts of election 
infrastructure.
  When I say nuts and bolts, I mean that quite literally. Over the past 
2 days, the Committee on House Administration, of which I am the 
ranking Democratic member, has learned from the manufacturers that 
actually build the sophisticated, durable equipment that Americans use 
to exercise their right of franchise, equipment used not only by 
Americans, by the way, but voters all over the world, many of whom have 
struggled to attain the right to vote and will retain it only if their 
nations' democracies are conducted honestly. While we have a long 
history and are not at risk, we are at risk of retaining the confidence 
of our people that their votes will be accurately counted when their 
voices are raised to participate in democracy.
  For that reason, it is not an exaggeration, I think, to say that the 
voting machine manufacturers build the tools that make democracies all 
over the world live up to their names. They produce what I will call 
the ``voting veins of democracy.'' And how well those veins carry votes 
forward to an accurate count can be the difference between a democracy 
whose heart pumps strongly and faithfully and a system that does not 
enjoy the confidence of its citizens.
  Over the past 2 days, 13 vendors have displayed the newest technology 
available in the voting machine industry in the Committee on House 
Administration room. Members of Congress, their staffs, the media, and 
the general public have had the opportunity to test the machines and to 
ask questions. I saw the full range of what the voting technology 
industry is developing, including Optiscan equipment and Direct Read 
Equipment, so-called DRE, computer touch-screen equipment. I also 
learned and other Members and staff learned about sophisticated 
software and hardware to ensure that voting is accessible to all 
Americans, and ``all'' needs to be underlined, that votes are counted 
accurately and completely, and that voters have a chance to correct 
mismarked ballots before they are cast.
  That is so critically important, Madam Speaker, as the gentlewoman 
well knows. What we have found is a system that counts at the precinct 
level is much more accurate than a system that counts at a central 
location after the voter has left, where there is no opportunity to 
tell the voter, you forgot to vote, you overvoted, you made a mistake, 
do you want to try to correct your ballot. People make mistakes, but we 
should not subject them to the vagaries of the possibility of making a 
mistake when we have technology that can say to them, either you did 
not vote for President, do you want to; you do not have to, we are not 
forcing you to, but do you want to? Did you forget this? Or, hey, you 
voted for two people for President and that will not be counted. Do you 
want to correct it? Give them that opportunity so they can ensure the 
fact that they have exercised their franchise correctly.
  We also learned about sophisticated software and hardware devices to 
ensure that voting is accessible to those with disabilities, to those 
who are even quadriplegic and cannot use hands or feet, to those who 
are blind, to those who have other impairments. We can fully make 
accessible the voting system to them and provide for the secrecy of 
their ballot as well. That technology is available. We need to pursue 
it.
  What I did not see on display, I am happy to say, is the latest in 
punch card technology. Why? Because almost everybody has concluded that 
punch cards have seen their day and ought to be on their way. The fact 
of the matter is, Florida, with only two dissenting votes, has mandated 
the abolition of the use of punch cards in their State. Only two 
dissenting votes, unanimous in the Senate and two in the House. They 
came up with money, and the President's brother, Governor Jeb Bush, 
signed the bill and they are proceeding to do that. I am hopeful that 
President Bush will follow the lead of his brother, Governor Bush, and 
help us take that same path.
  Any industry operating at the cutting edge can teach us a lot about 
the future of technology. What I have learned from the voting 
technology industry in the past 2 days is that there is no future for 
that punch card. Inventors may yet devise a better mousetrap. What they 
will not devise, however, is a better punch card.
  The punch card will soon be obsolete. I look forward to the day when 
it will be on display downtown in the Smithsonian and not in the voting 
precinct. We may talk about those days between November 8 and December 
12 when we were mesmerized by the 537 votes, or the 219 votes, or the 
five votes that would make a difference in counting these punch cards, 
and whether or not they would make a difference in Florida's electoral 
votes. We are beyond that, and it is not the purpose of anybody on this 
floor to look back. It is, however, to learn from that history and not 
see it repeated.
  I have also learned that taking advantage of the latest, most 
reliable and accessible technology represented in that room, in the 
Committee on House Administration room, that voting technology will not 
be cheap. Now, relatively speaking, in my opinion, it will not be 
extraordinarily expensive either, and it is worth the price. But the 
average DRE machine runs about $4,500. That is a touch-screen machine 
or some other computer technology. The average Optiscan technology 
where one fills out the ballot as if one is taking a test, and take a 
number 2 pencil or something else and connect the dots, or connect the 
line, and then put it into the counting machine and have it scanned 
optically, from which it gets its name. If you have not voted 
correctly, if you have overvoted, it simply kicks it out, and says, you 
have made a mistake, you get it back and you can correct it. But that 
costs about $5,000 to $6,000.
  While communities should be expected to help pay for much of the cost 
of these machines, we in Congress have an obligation to foot the bill. 
For over 200 years, States and localities have been conducting 
elections, and during those 200-plus years, they have had Federal 
officials running on their ballots, and they have paid the full price. 
We, in effect, have gotten a free lunch. It is appropriate that we at 
the Federal level, as State and local governments do, participate in 
partnership in ensuring the accurate, accessible elections of our 
officials. After all, we in Congress are elected on the machines that 
are now in use, including the punch card devices that were used in 
72,000 of the 200,000 voting precincts last year.
  We in Congress will be elected on the new machines that start 
entering service in the months ahead, I hope by 2002. It is therefore, 
Madam Speaker, appropriate that we help with guidelines and 
encouragement to local subdivisions to run these elections as best they 
possibly can, in this, probably the most technologically proficient 
Nation on the face of the Earth. Surely, surely, we can, we must. It is 
our sacred obligation to ensure that this Nation, a beacon of democracy 
for all the world, is as good a democracy as the world thinks it is and 
as we know it to be.

                              {time}  1545

  I might say, I also look forward to joining the gentlewoman on 
Saturday when we go to Chicago where we will hear from voters and those 
who administer elections as to how best we can make the system work.
  I thank the gentlewoman for her leadership.
  Ms. WATERS. I thank the gentleman from Maryland so very much for all 
of the work that he has put into this issue of election reform. I thank 
him for the attention he has paid to the committee, and I thank him for 
the work that he is doing to come up with legislation dealing with this 
technology.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask the gentleman from Texas and the gentleman from 
Maryland to join me as we close out in a colloquy just reinforcing how 
important this issue is.

[[Page 8319]]

  I would just like to say to the gentleman from Texas, I was listening 
to him as he talked about the work of his father, a man that I loved 
dearly and paid a lot of attention to, and hope to follow in his 
footsteps, by the way.
  I thought about the work that I have done here, the issues I have 
been involved in: women's issues, women's health issues, criminal 
justice issues, AIDS issues, foreign affairs issues, et cetera. But I 
think that this work that we are doing on election reform may be the 
most important work that I will do in my entire career here in the 
Congress of the United States.
  Do Members feel that this work holds that kind of priority, I ask the 
gentleman?
  Mr. GONZALEZ. Mr. Speaker, I think our colleague, the gentleman from 
Maryland, said it, that it really is almost a sacred duty because it is 
a sacred trust. Nothing rises to the level of the importance of this 
issue.
  People sometimes think we are given to hyperbole and exaggeration, 
but we really are talking about the fundamentals of a democracy, the 
absolute right of the public to be masters of their own destiny. It is 
the right to vote.
  Again, this is not a Republican or a Democratic issue. That is the 
beauty of it, too. It transcends party lines, philosophies, everything; 
station in left. This is basically the common thread, more or less, 
that our citizenry really holds in common.
  So I agree with the gentlewoman, I do not think there is going to be 
anything more important that I will ever work on. I am the lucky one. I 
have only been here 3 years. I am lucky to have this opportunity.
  But truly in relation to all the wonderful leaders who have preceded 
us, and we are thinking about the Civil Rights Act and so on, what we 
are talking about is really giving life to those laws, and life and 
meaning to the Constitution. So we are privileged, but by the same 
token, I think it is a tremendous responsibility. We cannot fail.
  Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, as I work with the committee members and as 
I listen to all that has been said here today, and as I stand here as 
an African American woman, and to my right I have a gentleman 
representing Texas of Hispanic descent, and I have here on my left the 
gentleman from Maryland, a Caucasian gentleman, we are really the 
rainbow of America on this issue.
  I think that all Americans, no matter where we are in this country, 
no matter what our backgrounds are, all Americans care about this 
cornerstone of democracy.
  Would the gentleman say this is a very central issue?
  Mr. HOYER. I think the gentlewoman is absolutely right. The polls 
reflect that. The polls reflect overwhelmingly that Americans expect us 
to fix the problem of which they were made aware last November and 
December.
  They were shocked to learn that many absentee ballots and overseas 
ballots were never counted in the course of running the elections. It 
was just expected by election officials if they were not going to make 
a difference, they would not be counted. I was chagrined. I may not 
have been shocked, but I was certainly chagrined to hear that.
  I am a white male, who from the very start of this nation everybody 
presumed would vote. Margaret Brent was the first woman lawyer. She 
came from Maryland. She was on the Governor's Council. Governor Calvert 
died, and she asked for a vote. She was denied that vote.
  It is incredible to me that we have had to amend the Constitution on 
a number of occasions in this connection. Thomas Jefferson intoned 
words that all of us recite, that all men, presumably but not 
necessarily meaning women as well, were endowed by their Creator with 
certain inalienable rights, and among these are life, liberty, and the 
pursuit of happiness.
  Clearly it was the concept of so many of us that that meant all of 
us, but clearly, it did not mean all of us. It was not until a great 
civil war and the Thirteenth Amendment that we ensured that, at least 
legally, African Americans could not be discriminated against.
  But we know as a result of poll taxes and literacy tests and the 
imposition of devices to intimidate people from registering and coming 
to vote that that was honored more in the breach than it was in the 
adherence.
  We know that immigrants, nonwhite Caucasian Americans, had 
difficulty, for which the father of the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
Gonzalez) was a giant in saying, that is not right.
  We did not add women, and an African American woman, or African 
Americans, men at least, could vote before women could vote. It was 
incredible that in the enlightened democracy of America in 1914 and 
1918 women could not vote. We had to pass a constitutional amendment 
which said that we are not going to discriminate on the basis of 
gender.
  It was not until 1965, as the gentlewoman knows, when we passed the 
Voting Rights Act that we said, we cannot have poll taxes, we cannot 
have literacy taxes, we cannot preclude, and the Federal government is 
going to step in and ensure that every American has access to the 
polling place? Why? Because it is central.
  Then we had another constitutional amendment and said that if one is 
old enough to go overseas and fight to defend democracy, one is old 
enough to vote at 18. We amended the Constitution again. So this has 
been an ongoing process of ensuring that our democracy is participated 
in by every citizen, not just a select few.
  This effort is about that objective. Again, I think the gentlewoman 
is correct, it is a critically important objective.
  Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlemen for participating with 
me today. They have both stated so clearly and in so many ways that 
something is wrong with the system and we perhaps fell asleep at the 
wheel, and we allowed the infrastructure to kind of fall apart.
  Many of us thought with the 1965 Voting Rights Act that we had gotten 
rid of all of the problems. Little did we know that we would reach a 
time when we could not recruit polling place workers. Little did we 
know that we would have a system that did not train them so they would 
know what to do when a provisional ballot was needed. Little did we 
ever dream that we would find ourselves at a time when there is a 
polling place with almost 100 percent Latino voters and no one to do 
translation, or to make sure that they have access to that vote and to 
that ballot.
  I want Members to know how proud I am to serve here in the Congress 
of the United States, and to serve with Members who care so much that 
they make this their priority work.
  I want Members to know how proud I am to be able to do the kind of 
work my ancestors would certainly have me do, and I am so proud that I 
have been given this opportunity, and that the people who have joined 
with me appointed to this committee are working very hard.
  Yes, we have been to Texas, we have been to Pennsylvania, and we are 
on our way to Chicago, a place that really does need us. It has needed 
us for a long time. We are on our way there to find out what we can do 
to strengthen the system. But we will be going to many other places.
  Let me conclude by saying, as a Californian, a suit has been filed in 
California by the ACLU because, as sophisticated as we are supposed to 
be, guess what, we rank right up there with some of the other States 
like Illinois where votes are thrown out, not counted, because of 
overvoting and other problems in the system.
  So hopefully both Members will be able to join me in California as we 
take a look at this suit and see what we can do.
  Mr. REYES. Mr. Speaker, as Chairman of the Congressional Hispanic 
Caucus, I am committed to building on the success of growing Latino 
voter turnout by working with my colleagues to achieve meaningful 
election reform before the 2002 elections.
  The 2000 presidential election has brought long overdue attention to 
the need to overhaul our country's election procedures and provide 
resources that will ensure we have accurate elections. Central to these 
efforts must be the protection of each citizen's ability to freely 
exercise his or her right to vote.

[[Page 8320]]

  Throughout our nation's history, expansion of the right to vote has 
been a struggle, and it is a struggle that continues to this day. The 
glare of media coverage, caused by the closest presidential election of 
our time, exposed voting irregularities that have long been ignored all 
across the country, not just in Florida.
  Numerous legislative proposals have been introduced in this Congress 
to address election reform, and I believe it is encouraging to see that 
so many members are making this a priority. While there are about a 
dozen different bills, they also share many similarities. It is clear 
that based on the proposals we have seen so far, we need to move toward 
establishing a new elections body that will be charged with 
distributing grants to local election authorities for modernizing 
voting procedures and providing incentives to voting machine 
manufacturers to improve their equipment and invest in research and 
development.
  In order to gain useful knowledge necessary for the effective 
modernization of our voting system, a study will need to be conducted 
of voting irregularities in the 2000 election and of flaws in our 
voting system in general.
  As we chart our way through these various reforms, which coincide 
with another upcoming round of redistricting, the significance of 
minority representation is going to be greater than ever. Where 
necessary, we must be prepared to reaffirm support for, and strengthen, 
the provisions of the Voting Rights Act and National Voter Registration 
Act that protect minority representation and bilingual elections 
services.
  The problems facing the integrity of our elections fall into two 
broad categories: (1) logistical challenges, and (2) barriers to voter 
turnout.
  There are three main logistical problems prevalent in the process of 
running elections. First, local election boards are typically 
underfunded. As a result, counties are unable to replace antiquated 
voting machines. The punchcard ballots made infamous by the Florida 
recount are used by about one third of voters. Replacing them all with 
a more reliable system will be a costly, though certainly worthwhile 
investment.
  Second, there is a shortage of adequately trained staff to respond in 
a timely and professional manner to voters' questions about absentee 
voting, their registration status, polling place locations and other 
concerns. On election day itself, many polling places open late, are 
not open long enough or lack polling place workers who are adequately 
trained, further causing delays, confusion and the disenfranchisement 
of voters. In particular, there is a lack of bilingual staff who are 
able to help voters who face a language barrier at the polls.
  Third, polling place access is an extremely important logistical 
issue, and is not always directly related to funding. Every polling 
place should be easily accessible and in safe, familiar locations that 
are easy for residents to find.
  The most troubling obstacle to fair elections is voter suppression, 
which is aimed almost exclusively at minorities. Unfortunately, such 
tactics are prevalent across the country and not only targeted against 
African-American voters. The practice of placing so-called security 
guards, or volunteers in clothing that resemble uniforms, at polling 
places has been used to intimidate Latino voters in past elections. The 
use of misleading radio broadcasts or other means to confuse minority 
voters about their polling place location is another tactic employed to 
keep down minority turnout. First-time voters, such as newly 
naturalized citizens, many of whom are Latino, are particularly 
susceptible to confusion about the voting process, especially because 
relatively less, if any, election information is provided in Spanish.
  In response, state and county governments must be spurred to pro-
actively prevent voter suppression in heavily minority precincts. To 
ensure smoother elections, there needs to be greater investment and 
attention in such precincts to ensure appropriate staffing levels and 
training, equipment, polling place site selection, and education 
campaigns.
  We will need to consider ways of enhancing the enforcement of 
existing laws that punish voter intimidation and implement new or 
stronger penalties where necessary. We should also consider expanding 
the scope of such efforts to include more passive forms of voter 
suppression, such as the withholding of assistance and information to 
voters might prevent them from voting. For example, there have been 
many accounts of polling place workers refusing to allow voters the 
right to a provisional ballot, a right that was expanded under the 1993 
National Voter Registration Act.
  A final obstacle to voter turnout relates to the maintenance of voter 
registration rolls, which must be considerably improved. Latino voters 
have experienced problems with getting on the rolls in the first place 
and then later being purged from them. The problem with getting on the 
rolls is related to problems with voter registration. Voter 
registration forms have been rejected for arbitrary reasons, such as 
being filled out with the wrong color ink, and during the most recent 
election, there were reports from Florida of Latinos who had registered 
but whose names did not appear on the rolls and were therefore barred 
from voting.
  The other side of the voter roll problem is when legitimate names are 
purged. In a number of states, voters are purged from the voter rolls 
if they do not vote in every presidential election or a set number of 
elections within a certain amount of time. Requiring voters to re-
register if they happen to miss an election, or else risk being 
ineligible to vote in a subsequent election, is just another barrier to 
voting.
  I will be working with my colleagues in the Congressional Hispanic 
Caucus to press for increased funding of election boards; promote voter 
participation through national legislative and educational efforts; and 
monitor existing voter protections, especially the 1975 and 1992 
amendments to the Voting Rights Act which protect language minority 
groups and require bilingual services.
  Voting is a hard-won right that should not be a struggle for 
minorities in every election. In addition to empowering minority 
citizens about their rights as voters, we can also make considerable 
progress toward improving the way we run and monitor elections, making 
them as easy and convenient for minority voters as they already are in 
so many affluent and pre-dominantly white precincts. In the Latino 
community, we often say su voto es su voz--your vote is your voice. We 
must ensure that we take the necessary steps to ensure that the voices 
of all voters are heard.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise because we must 
continue to address the overwhelming evidence of grave voting 
irregularities and voting rights violations in the recent presidential 
election in what was the closest and most contested presidential 
election in the history of our great nation.
  It is imperative that Congress continues to engage in a serious 
review and comprehensive reform of our election process in this nation. 
The disenfranchisement of voters in the federal electoral process 
remains a chilling threat to the integrity of our democratic system in 
America.
  Mr. Speaker, The right to vote, and to fully exercise that vote, is a 
vital component of our collective preservation. On November 7th, 2000, 
only a fraction of Americans were able to exercise their right to vote 
and have those votes counted, while thousands, and perhaps even 
millions of voters were denied this constitutional right as guaranteed 
by the Fifteenth Amendment.
  It is horrifying to me that such systemic mistakes were made in this 
election. But beyond these mistakes, there have been serious 
allegations of violations of the Sections 2 and 5 of the Voter Rights 
Act of 1965, 42 U.S.C. sec. 1973, which mandates the obligation and 
responsibility of the Congress to provide appropriate implementation of 
the guarantees of the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which 
states ``the fundamental principle that the right to vote shall not be 
denied or abridged by the States or the Federal Government on account 
of race or color.'' Yet we know today, that such violations of 
fundamental voting rights did occur during the November 7th elections 
throughout the nation. These irregularities also raise potential 
violations of several provisions of the National Voter Registration Act 
of 1993, 42 U.S.C. sec. 1973gg-5(a) which affirms the right of every 
U.S. citizen to cast a ballot and have that ballot be counted. We must 
address this today.
  The need for election reform is the challenge of all Americans. 
President Bush himself recognized this urgency, telling members of 
Congress: ``This is America. Everyone deserves the right to vote.'' 
Congress was reaffirmed of President Bush's commitment to the 
protection of the right to vote when the President's spokesman later 
assured members of Congress that the ``President wants to make certain 
that one of the focuses of attention this year is electoral reform.'' A 
letter recently sent to President Bush by virtually every House 
Democrat, called on the administration fulfill this promise by 
providing ``essential guidance and leadership on a national problem'', 
yet today, half a year after the election, we are still without such 
leadership. So I call on the Attorney General of the United States to 
begin a full investigation of all alleged voting improprieties. We must 
clear the air.
  So what can be done to remedy these problems for the future? 
According to a recent Washington Post article by David Broder, since 
the 2000 presidential election more than

[[Page 8321]]

1,500 election reform bills have been introduced in state legislatures 
around this nation. The American Civil Liberties Union and other 
organizations have been filing suits in California and in other states 
demanding that uniform methods of casting and counting ballots be put 
in place. I applaud these efforts and I believe that outdated 
technology is a large part of the problem.
  We also need a greater awareness of how our voting system works. We 
need better and more uniform standards, better enforcement, better 
education, greater and more convenient access to voting places, and a 
generally easier and more user-friendly electoral process.
  To begin to address these problems, I have introduced several 
important pieces of legislation. I've recently introduced H.R. 934, a 
bill that would establish National Election Day on the 2nd Tuesday of 
November, in presidential election years, as a legal public holiday in 
order to substantially resolve the serious problem of the lack of time 
for people to vote or participate in the federal election process, due 
to employment commitments.
  This bill would merely federalize what some states have done with 
great success so that employees in the private sector will be able to 
exercise their constitutional right to vote or take part in the 
electoral process as election volunteers with no restraints.
  I've also introduced H.R. 60, the Secure Democracy for All Americans 
Act, which would establish a five member commission and provide funding 
necessary to perform a study into federal, state, and local voting 
procedures in order to produce a report and make recommendations for 
appropriate legislation and administrative actions. This legislation is 
greatly needed.
  In addition, I've recently founded the bipartisan Congressional 
Election Reform Caucus, which was established to enable all members of 
Congress to engage in a serious review and dialogue of the election 
process in this nation as a recognition of the disenfranchisement of 
voters because of voter confusion, poor voter machinery and work 
commitments.
  I have also drafted legislation that provides for much needed 
``provisional ballots'' so that people erroneously ``purged'' or 
dropped from the voting rolls can register at the polls, vote, and have 
that vote counted. I am also introducing legislation that would create 
a uniform voter ``purging'' requirement, because too many states and 
localities have confusing and conflicting standards of how long you may 
remain inactive as a voter before your name is purged from the voting 
rolls. With my legislation, you would have a single uniform 10 years 
from the time you last voted until you are purged from the rolls. This 
makes good sense.
  I would also like to commend Congressman Cummings for today 
introducing electoral reform legislation, and for the commitment to 
this issue by the Congressional Black Caucus and by the many other 
members of this Congress who believe in this legislation.
  These bills affirm our constitutional right, as citizens of this 
democracy, to vote and have that vote counted, because if our votes are 
not counted, our voices are not heard. I hope that in the months to 
come, our voices will come together in support of common-sense 
solutions and reform, and bring us closer towards our goal of equal 
access and equal justice under the law.

                          ____________________