Sense of the House Regarding Postponement of a Presidential Election

SENSE OF THE HOUSE REGARDING POSTPONEMENT OF A PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION -- (House of Representatives - July 20, 2004)

Mr. NEY. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 728) expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the actions of terrorists will never cause the date of any Presidential election to be postponed and that no single individual or agency should be given the authority to postpone the date of a Presidential election.

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Mr. BAIRD. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Connecticut for yielding me this time and thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ney).

I want to raise a question here because, first of all, I absolutely agree that the executive branch must not be given the authority or must not assume the authority to change our elections. On that I one hundred percent agree. That must be the purview and the prerogative of the United States Congress.

But I just want to raise a question. The issue really is not the holding of elections. The issue is whether or not in the elections everyone's vote gets counted, and we must be very careful in our rhetorical concerns to not just say they will never disrupt the elections but to instead ensure that terrorists not allow individual votes to not be counted.

We have seen elections in which individual votes were not counted, and that is the threat to the democracy. And I mean this very seriously. It is quite plausible to imagine scenarios wherein we go forth with an election, but individual votes are not counted and thereby the election of an individual as President of the United States or as Members of the House or Senate does produce an outcome, but the outcome is not based on a fair and full counting of each of our votes.

And that is my concern. And my concern, frankly, is I think we are moving this forward too fast. My own preference would be to follow something along the lines of what Norm Ornstein recommended, and that is appoint a commission to study in the interim what the possible scenarios are and what our opportunities are because if, for example, one State, let us say California, is attacked by terrorists and the number of the votes are not in some way able to be tallied, are we today setting a marker in the ground that says it is better not to count the votes of the State of California or to only partially count those in order that we can say the election was held on time?

Quite frankly, I am not comfortable with the results of elections where we have said what matters is that we say we have held the election rather than we say what matters is every single person's vote is counted. It is that principle on which the integrity of a democratic Republic depends, not merely holding elections on a designated time.

So I will very likely vote for this, but I will do so with reservations. And I would suggest that if we do pass this resolution, we not assume that in so doing we have solved this problem. Nor do we assume that in so doing, we have assured the American people that their votes will be counted. Because the American people say not that we must hold the election on the first Tuesday of November. What they say is, most important is my vote must count. In the past it has not counted, and it must count ever after.

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Mr. BAIRD. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time.

I appreciate the discussion here. I absolutely agree. I want to underscore that. The gentleman, I could not agree more; it must not reside with one person. Frankly, not because we feel that way, not because we cannot think of who that one person would be, but because the Constitution of the United States of America has never said that the President or a designee of the President can delay an election. That must reside with Congress, if anything is going to happen to elections.

But I really do want to underscore, what is the purpose of an election? The purpose of an election is not simply to say we had an election and someone was declared the winner. The purpose of the election is to understand the will of the majority of the American people.

If events, be they natural or terrorist, in some way distort the ability of us to accurately glean and determine the will of the American people, then that is to be of profound consideration.

My concern, again, is we must first and foremost ask ourselves what mechanisms are in place to ensure that the will of the American people is accurately recorded and counted, not what mechanisms are in place so that at the close of business on November 2 we can all declare we have had an election. That is all I am trying to say here.

I absolutely applaud the gentleman for saying no one person must make this decision. If nothing else than that, I would vote for this resolution. But I think we must step back after that and say, What mechanisms do we have in place? If on Election Day something profound has happened, be it terrorist or natural, that we reliably can reliably say we do not have an accurate count at the end of this day, should we move forward so that we can say, We had an election; or should we have some mechanism in place to ask ourselves, Has this mechanism of an election been valid? And if it has not been valid, then it behooves us and it is our duty to the American people and the voters to say, We are going to do something beforehand to make sure it is valid and not leave it up to chance. That is all I am trying to say.

So if we pass this, let us please continue this discussion, and ask if something does happen that interferes with your right to have your vote counted and accurately represented, we have some mechanism to anticipate that.