6 days of early voting up for vote

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Voters could have an extra six days to cast ballots during the 2016 presidential election if a proposal to change the Missouri Constitution gets enough support on Election Day.

Touted by Republicans as making voting more accessible and faulted by Democrats as not making it accessible enough, proposed Amendment 6 would allow registered voters to cast a ballot for six days ending the Wednesday before a general election, not including weekends. Unlike the six-week period of absentee voting in Missouri, residents wouldn't need an excuse to vote -- in-person or with mail-in ballots -- early.

The catch: Local election offices could hold early voting only if the state agrees to pay for the costs, estimated at close to $2 million the first year and at least $100,000 per election in following years. That has some local clerks worried they might not get enough state funding and be saddled with expenses. To that end, a state appeals court panel ordered a description of the initiative for the Nov. 4 ballot be changed to add the state-dependent funding.

Currently, 33 states and the District of Columbia allow residents to vote early without an excuse, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Republican-controlled legislatures in Ohio and Wisconsin have taken recent steps to curtail early voting by limiting the days it is available.

Missouri's GOP-controlled Legislature began pursuing an early-voting amendment this spring in response to a push by Democratic-aligned groups for a six-week period. That proposal, which failed to get enough signatures to make the ballot, also would have allowed voting on Saturdays and Sundays for the final 21 days before federal or state elections.

Rep. Tony Dugger, a Hartville Republican who sponsored the ballot proposal up for a vote, said if Missourians vote too early, they could miss important information about candidates that sometimes only comes to light closer to the election.

"Six weeks out is a long time to start thinking about voting," Dugger said. "People don't have their minds made up at that point."

Democrats and the American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri have called Amendment 6 a "sham," pointing to its prohibition of early voting on weekends.

More time to vote and greater accessibility typically is considered an advantage for Democrats, who are believed to get greater support from low-income residents who struggle to get time off work or have transportation challenges, ACLU of Missouri executive director Jeffrey Mittman said.

But research on the effect of early voting on turnout is mixed. The Early Voting Information Center at Reed College found early voting generally increases voter turnout by 2 percent to 4 percent, but professors at the University of Wisconsin-Madison reported the opposite, saying it sometimes decreases voter turnout and aides Republicans.

Richard Reuben, a law professor and voting rights expert at the University of Missouri-Columbia, said the initiative wouldn't give voters much more flexibility than what they already have with absentee voting.

"It seems to promise a lot," Reuben said, "but in fact it doesn't really promote anything that for practical proposes isn't there already."

Christian County Clerk Kay Brown said voters should consider it's "nearly impossible" to change the state constitution once it's amended.

"Right now, it might be appropriate," said Brown, who also is president of the Missouri Association of County Clerks and Election Authorities, "but in 20 years, will that still be something we want to do?"

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Online:

Constitutional Amendment 6: http://sos.mo.gov/elections/2014ballot

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