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Is electronic voting unconstitutional?
Having considered the electronic voting system for some time, I have come to the conclusion that electronic voting is probably unconstitutional. Consider the following points:- 1. Article 5 of the constitution states that Ireland is a "democratic state". 2. The ability of opposition parties and groups to verify that an election result is correct is an essential feature of a democratic election 3. Given that it is not possible for those monitoring an election to establish what is happening inside the voting machines or the computers counting votes, the introduction of electronic voting means that it is no longer possible for opposition groups to verify that an election result is correct. If both statements 2 and 3 are true then the electronic voting system must be unconstitutional. Notes:- 1 is a statement of fact 2 I cannot believe that anyone can dispute statement 2. For example, suppose that an election is contested between X and Y. An election where only X can count the votes is surely undemocratic. (For X, read the state in the Nice referendum, for Y read the No campaigners) 3a. It is quite clearly impossible for members of opposition parties and groups to monitor an election held using electronic voting. It is not possible for an election observer to tell what program or programs are running within the voting machine. Nor is it possible for the observer to tell whether the votes are being recorded accurately or not. It is not acceptable to have to rely on a system supplied by the state. Consider the recent Nice referendum - the state was effectively on one side of the contest. 3b. Consider the 1998 Good Friday referendum in Northern Ireland. The Yes side was supported by the British government and by all the main parties in Northern Ireland. The only significant party on the No side was the DUP. The DUP, fearing manipulation of the votes by the state, went to enormous lengths to monitor the voting and to ensure that the result was correct. They were able to ensure that the declared result was accurate, but only because the traditional system of paper ballots and ballot boxes were used. This system can be monitored by ordinary people (for example, the members of a political party) without any special training. The relevance of this example is that it closely parallels European referendums in the Republic. Suppose that the No campaign fear that the state is going to manipulate the result of the next European referendum - how can they possibly monitor what happens in the electronic voting machines supplied by the state? 3c. What is democracy? It is the system of government whereby the state is controlled its citizens. This control is exercised through elections. For citizens to control and monitor the elections, the process must be subject to monitoring by the citizens. Ask yourself the following questions:- Could you monitor the polling at a voting station where paper ballots are used and be certain that when polls closed that the ballot box contained the legimately cast votes? Virtually every voter could ensure that the ballot box at close of poll contains the legimately cast votes. It is a trivial task to watch pieces of paper being placed in a box. Could you monitor the polling at a voting station where electronic voting is used and be certain that when polls closed that the module extracted from a voting machine contained the legimately cast votes? Could you tell whether the correct version of the program is running in the voting machine? Could you tell whether the machine is being manipulated remotely? It is absurd to suggest that an electronic voting system can be monitored by the citizens of the state. For example, living in an age of mobile phones and wireless technology, it is ridiculous to suggest that an electronic device can be monitored by the ordinary voters. Not only is there no way of telling what is happening within the voting machines, virtually no voters, given a "module" extracted from a voting machine, would be able to tell what it contains. The McKenna judgement makes for interesting and relevant reading. The following extract from Justice Denham's judgement is worth considering: Leo Kohn in "The Constitution of the Irish Free State" (published by Allen and Unwin 1932) writing of the 1922 Constitution stated (see p 116):- "A constitution based on a wide suffrage, Proportional Representation and a rational distribution of constituencies, embodying an elaborate system of checks and balances designed to preclude the growth of autocratic tendencies in any of its organs, such a framework, whatever might be thought of the practicability of some of these devices, could claim to have not merely proclaimed the sovereignty of the people in the abstract, but to have invested it with concrete reality." These words could have been written of Bunreacht na hEireann. Today, with the jurisprudence which has grown around the Constitution, the words are fitting. There is no "elaborate system of checks and balances" with electronic voting - a tiny group of people control the system. Electronic voting encourages rather than precludes the "the growth of autocratic tendencies" within the state. It is all too easy to envisage a corrupt political party maintaining a permanent grip on power by manipulating election results using the electronic voting system. With electronic voting, the sovereignty of the people is "in the abstract". The overwhelming mass of the people cannot tell what is happening inside an electronic voting machine, nor can they interpret the modules produced by the system. With paper ballots and ballot boxes, the sovereignty of the people has a "concrete reality". The overwhelming mass of the people can tell what is happening inside a ballot box and they can open a ballot box and count the votes cast. If electronic voting is introduced on a national basis it will never again be possible to be certain that an election or referendum result is correct. Rigging an election held using a system of paper ballots requires the corruption of thousands of people nationwide. It is so difficult that there is little point in even attempting it. Rigging an election held using electronic voting requires only the corruption of those who control the computer system. How many people does it take to swap one disk or program for another? The fact that a tiny group of people (perhaps even one person) can secretly affect what happens in every ballot box in the country is the greatest danger of electronic voting. Note: This page does not consider the question of whether the sovereignty of the state is affected by handing control of the democratic process to private companies (the election administrators in the Department of the Environment are not capable of testing the electronic voting system - they commission external organisations to test them). |
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