LEXIS-NEXIS® Academic
Copyright 2001 The New York Times Company
The New York Times
November 12, 2001, Monday, Late Edition - Final
SECTION: Section A; Page 17; Column 1; National Desk
LENGTH: 1339 words
HEADLINE:
EXAMINING THE VOTE: THE PATTERNS;
Ballots Cast by Blacks and Older Voters Were Tossed in Far Greater Numbers
BYLINE:
By FORD FESSENDEN
BODY:
Black precincts had more than three times as many rejected ballots as white
precincts in last fall's presidential race in Florida, a disparity that
persists even after accounting for the effects of income, education and bad
ballot design, The New York Times found in a new statistical analysis of the
Florida vote.
The analysis of 6,000 precincts uses far more definitive data than previous
studies and shows a strong pattern of ballot rejection in black precincts that
is not explained by socioeconomic differences or voting technology. Similar
patterns were found in Hispanic precincts and places with large elderly
populations.
It did not matter whether the precinct used punch cards or paper ballots,
whether the neighborhoods were rich or poor or the ballot was straight or
butterflied. Precincts with more black, Hispanic and elderly voters had
substantially more spoiled ballots, The Times found.
The analysis did not suggest why blacks' ballots were more likely to have been
rejected, but critics of Florida's voting system have suggested that black
precincts were more likely to have older, unreliable voting machines and poorly
trained poll workers.
The question of who might have been unfairly disenfranchised by the voting in
Florida has been much debated in the aftermath of the 2000 election. The United
States Supreme Court stopped a recount, saying it might have violated equal
protection guarantees that should give everyone the same chance to cast a valid
vote.
But the election held substantial deviations from that one-person-one-vote
benchmark. For minorities, the ballot survey found, a recount would not have
redressed the inequities because most ballots were beyond retrieving. But a
recount could have restored the votes of thousands of older voters whose
dimpled and double-voted ballots were indecipherable to machines but would have
been clear in a ballot-by-ballot review.
The possibility that the Florida voting was racially discriminatory is a
central issue in a debate over the Voting Rights Act, which subjects to federal
oversight the voting laws of jurisdictions with a history of discrimination.
Conservatives have argued that discrepancies in disqualified ballots between
the races result from voter errors, not discrimination, and say the evidence
lies in the fact that disqualified ballots are statistically associated with
education and literacy, not race.
The Times review of the Florida numbers showed that education indeed was a
powerful predictor of ballot disqualification. Lower education has often been
associated with mismarked ballots, but the Florida results may have been
especially pronounced. Precincts with large numbers of people with less than a
ninth-grade education had a 10 percent ballot spoilage rate, while precincts
where most of the people have college degrees had a rejection rate of just 1
percent.
But education was not the only factor. The widespread use of ballots in which
the 10 presidential candidates were listed in more than one column was
associated with thousands of ballot rejections. In the 18 counties that used
such ballots, ballot spoilage was five times as high as in those that did not.
Yet, even after those factors and others were accounted for, the study showed a
significantly higher rate of rejected ballots in precincts with a large
proportion of black voters -- in all, 9 to 10 percent lost votes, compared with
about 2 percent for whites. In Hispanic precincts, the rate was 4 percent, but
not all counties reported Hispanic voters as a separate ethnic group.
"The finding about black voters is really strong," said Philip Klinkner, a political science professor at Hamilton College who
has studied the Florida vote and reviewed the Times study.
"It raises the issue about whether there's some way that the voting system is
set up that discriminates against blacks."
There is no conclusive evidence of systematic efforts to discriminate against
blacks, but this pattern -- the same kind that courts look at in determining
racial discrimination in voting rights lawsuits -- raises suspicions.
"It raises questions about how they administer elections -- where they put the
best voting machines, how many poll workers they put out, what kind of
education is done," Mr. Klinkner said.
Alan J. Lichtman, a political science professor at American University,
said, "It suggests there was not just a disparate effect, but disparate
treatment -- not necessarily deliberate -- of black voters in the election."
Mr. Lichtman came to a similar conclusion in a study of more limited data
for the United States Civil Rights Commission.
John Lott, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative
research organization, who has argued that other factors can account for the
pattern among black voters, said his own analysis of Florida precincts showed a
correlation between black voters and spoiled ballots but contended it was not
discrimination because it affected black Republicans more than black Democrats.
Because ballots are secret, it is impossible to know exactly whose votes were
rejected. But a statistical analysis of voting patterns and demographics at the
precinct level allows some inferences about the behavior of groups and is far
more reliable than similar studies of county voting patterns have been.
Consider the Florida voting districts with high education levels -- those in
which 30 to 40 percent of the population has a college degree, in a state where
the average is about 20 percent. In majority-black, high-education precincts,
3.7 percent of the ballots were thrown out. In white precincts with that
education level, just 1.9 percent were thrown out.
At the low end of the education scale, there was a similar pattern. In
precincts with relatively high numbers of people with less than ninth-grade
educations, black precincts had 10.4 percent of ballots thrown out, white
precincts 5.3 percent.
Counties that used confusing ballot designs -- the infamous butterfly ballot in
Palm Beach, and two-column ballots in 17 other counties -- created large
numbers of rejected ballots. But again, blacks fared worse than whites -- 18.2
percent of ballots in mostly black precincts where two-column or butterfly
ballots were used were rejected, three times higher than in white areas.
Blacks were not the only voters consistently disenfranchised in the Florida
balloting. Hispanics and voters over 65 were about twice as likely as whites to
cast rejected ballots, and the differential persisted in spite of technology or
educational differences.
The Times study shows that the punch-card voting system, often the object of
blame for Florida's voting problems, played only a minor role in ballot
rejection rates for minority and lesser-educated voters. The two-column ballot
was a much greater hindrance.
But punch cards did play a large role in disenfranchising older voters, The
Times found in reviewing a database of uncounted ballots put together by a
consortium of media organizations. Precincts with concentrations of older
voters had substantially larger numbers of dimpled ballots that could have been
counted in a manual recount with a permissive standard.
The consortium's ballot review shows that at most, about 25,000 of the 175,000
rejected ballots held evidence of voter intent. Those were proportionally
distributed among blacks, whites and Hispanics, so in the language of voting
rights, a recount would not have redressed their disproportionate loss of
voting influence.
But a hand recount that allowed dimpled ballots to be counted might have given
voters over 65 with spoiled ballots about a 50 percent better chance of having
their votes counted because they were significantly more likely than other
voters to punch a card too gently to detach the perforated chad. In punch-card
precincts where elderly people made up 85 percent of the voters, 1 in 200
ballots held a dimple on which intent could be determined. In the rest of the
state, the number was about 1 in 300.
http://www.nytimes.com
GRAPHIC: Chart:
"Different Systems, Different Margins"
How vote margins might have been different depending on which counting systems
were used in the 36 days after the election.
Florida Supreme Court recount: Bush ahead
If the U.S. Supreme Court had not stopped the recount ordered by the Florida
Supreme Court. This tally examines only the sets of ballots that each county's
election officials said they would have recounted, using the standards they
would have applied. Counties that said they would not have conducted a recount
are not included.
Gore's request: Bush ahead
If Gore's request to recount four heavily-Democratic counties, Broward,
Miami-Dade, Palm Beach and Volusia, had all been completed and counted in the
certified results.
Dimple with other dimples: Gore ahead
If a statewide recount had been conducted of all the disqualifed ballots
counting dimpled punch-card votes if there were dimples on the rest of the
ballot. This standard was used in Palm Beach County at some points during their
hand recounts.
Statewide recount: Gore ahead
If a statewide recount of all disqualified ballots had been undertaken using
the standards each county's election officials have said they would use in a
recount.
Chart
In precincts where: More than 25 percent of the population has less than a
ninth grade education
And more than half of the residents are: Black
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 10.4
In precincts where: More than 25 percent of the population has less than a
ninth grade education
And more than half of the residents are: White
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 5.3
In precincts where: More than 25 percent of the population has less than a
ninth grade education
And more than half of the residents are: Hispanic
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 5.2
In precincts where: People vote on punch-card machines
And more than half of the residents are: Black
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 9.9
In precincts where: People vote on punch-card machines
And more than half of the residents are: White
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 3.2
In precincts where: People vote on punch-card machines
And more than half of the residents are: Hispanic
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 3.8
In precincts where: 30 percent to 40 percent of the population has a college
degree
And more than half of the residents are: Black
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 3.7
In precincts where: 30 percent to 40 percent of the population has a college
degree
And more than half of the residents are: White
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 1.9
In precincts where: 30 percent to 40 percent of the population has a college
degree
And more than half of the residents are: Hispanic
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 2.4
In precincts where: People voted on a ballot where the listing of candidates
was split
And more than half of the residents are: Black
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 18.2
In precincts where: People voted on a ballot where the listing of candidates
was split
And more than half of the residents are: White
Pct. of ballots disqualified: 6.4
In precincts where: People voted on a ballot where the listing of candidates
was split
And more than half of the residents are: Hispanic
Pct. of ballots disqualified: --
(Source: New York Times analysis of 1997 census estimates, Florida Secretary of
State voter registration list from January 2001, N.O.R.C. Florida Ballot
Project aligned database)
LOAD-DATE: November 12, 2001