Paul R. Hollrah

From Little ACORNS
October 20, 2008

Yes, from little ACORNS... Democrats grow. But it remains to be seen whether or not the American people are sufficiently outraged at efforts by the Obama campaign to steal the 2008 presidential election through outright fraud and vote-buying. The far left organization, ACORN, a former Obama client and a favorite Obama “charity,” is now under federal investigation in at least 13 states. After a recent raid on an ACORN office in Nevada, FBI agents found voter registration forms containing the names of the entire starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys.

But none of this is new. To speak of the Democratic Party and vote fraud is to be completely redundant. In a Senate floor speech on February 7, 1894, opposing Democratic efforts to repeal a Republican-sponsored civil rights act that provided federal marshals to insure black voting rights, Senator George Hoar (R-MA) said the following:

“Wherever there is a crevice in our protection of the freedom of the ballot, there you will find the Democratic Party trying to break through. Wherever we have left open an opportunity to get possession of an office, contrary to the true and constitutional will of the majority, there you will find that party pressing; there you will find that party exercising an ingenuity before which even the great inventive genius of the American People, exerted in other directions, fails and is insignificant in the comparison.

“... Mr. President, the nation must protect its own. Every citizen whose right is imperiled, if he be but one, when it is a right of national citizenship and a right conferred and enjoyed under the Constitution of the United States, has the right to demand for its protection the entire force of the United States until the Army has spent its last man and the Navy fired its last gun. Most of us have nothing else than the right to vote.... The urn in which the American casts his ballot ought to be, aye, and it shall be, as sacred as a sacramental vessel.”

No one could have said it better. Senator Hoar’s words of 1894 are as applicable today as they were 114 years ago. When Republicans enter the voting booths and cast one vote each, they have every right to expect that Democrats will do the same. Failing that, our entire democratic process becomes meaningless and the barrel of a gun becomes the next available alternative.

As matters now stand, the voter rolls and the electoral process have been so thoroughly poisoned by generations of Democratic miscreants that it may not be possible to reform and restore the present system. If the American people are to have their faith restored in our ability to conduct fair and honest elections, it may be necessary to scrap the entire system and begin all over again. If so, the following procedural changes are essential:

1) Voter registration must be done only in person. Fraud-friendly motor-voter, postcard, and same-day registration schemes must be either repealed or superseded.

2) Registrations must be done only by full-time paid employees of counties and/or township government. Third party registrars, paid and unpaid, must be prohibited.

3) Registration must be done only in the county and/or township in which the registrant maintains his/her primary residence.

4) At registration, each voter must show proof of citizenship (birth certificate, passport) and proof of residence (driver’s license, residential deed, apartment lease, utility bills, etc.).

5) Qualified voters must be issued a voter I.D. card with photo, permanent address, Social Security number, and precinct number which must thereafter be presented prior to voting.

6) County election boards must be provided with name, address, date of birth, and Social Security number of every individual convicted of a felony. Election boards must purge voter registrations rolls of all convicted felons at least ten days prior to any election.

7) County election boards must be provided with copies of all death certificates. Voter rolls must be purged of all deceased persons no later than ten days prior to any election.

8) Voters who move from one state to another, from one county or township to another, or from one precinct to another, must obtain a voter registration transfer document from the local election board. This document must be presented, in person, to county or township election board officials at the voter’s new place of residence.

9) Absentee ballots must be received no later than ten days prior to an election and absentee ballot totals must be tallied no later than the day and hour that polls close.

10) Absentee ballots completed by residents of hospitals, nursing homes, etc. must be completed only in the presence of representatives of both major political parties.

11) Other than absentee ballots, voting must be done in person, on the day of the election, and only in the precinct in which the voter maintains his/her primary place of residence. Fraud-friendly electronic voting and vote-by-mail schemes must be repealed.

12) Provisional ballots must be limited to the most serious instances of clerical error by election board officials.

13) The Voting Rights Act must be amended to provide significant fines and mandatory jail sentences for any individual who would, in any election, do any of the following: a) vote in the name of another person, b) vote or attempt to vote more than once, c) vote in the name of a deceased or fictitious person, d) vote in more than one state or political subdivision, e) vote without benefit of U.S. citizenship, f) intimidate, interfere with, or cause injury to the person or property of any other person peaceably engaged in the political process, or g) cause any other person to do any of the foregoing.

Like the bartender in the bawdyhouse who claimed not to know “what was going on upstairs,” Democratic elected officials and party leaders have ignored for too long the rampant fraud, violence, and intimidation that has been committed on their behalf. With the recent disclosures of widespread fraud by members of ACORN, a pro-Democratic activist group, it’s time they joined Republicans in cleaning up the corruption that they have created and/or condoned.