Absolutely Honest Elections

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Absolutely Honest Elections

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Absolutely Honest Elections
by Gregory Allan
10/24/2016


Never in my lifetime has there been more pre-election talk about election fraud. After elections there is always such talk. Anyone who has lived through more than one or two elections knows it's not uncommon for a candidate to challenge the outcome by demanding a recount.

Recounts are costly and, more importantly, inaccurate. If fraud was employed in the first count, it's unlikely it can be unraveled in the recount. Electronic voting machines are easy to hack, and leave no paper trail. So what, exactly, is being re-counted?

Whether you like him or hate him, it's thanks to Donald Trump, the Republican candidate for President of the United States, that we are having this discussion before the election. Election fraud and voter fraud are rampant, and are two sides of the same coin.

Election fraud is tampering with the outcome of elections at the administrative level. The fraud is done by the people who have been trusted to collect, handle, and count the ballots. This is the type of fraud the government and government-controlled mass media prefers we never talk (or even think) about.

Voter fraud is done by individual voters. Anyone who is ineligible to vote but votes anyway, is guilty of voter fraud. Other examples are voting more than once, voting with a phoney name, stuffing phoney ballots into the box, or tampering with absentee ballots. One might think there are as many ways to cheat as there are voters.

Using your favorite search engine, a search for "election fraud" brings up millions of hits (17,400,000 on Google just now). Voter fraud, ditto (6,460,000). Youtube displays videos showing real voting machines being hacked, and interviews with ex-employees of Diebold testifying before Congress that elections were stolen.

Millions of names are on voter registration rolls who are known to have been dead for years, and yet votes are routinely cast in their names. Many millions more vote in multiple jurisdictions, with no cross-referencing.

Every election, it seems someone is arrested and prosecuted for election or voter fraud. Such arrests are high-profile and widely reported, but they are few in number. Only the dumbest and most obvious are prosecuted, and then only if they are not politically connected. Such arrests are sacrificial lambs to public confidence in the system. The majority of offenders are rarely punished.

Could this be because the winning candidates are the beneficiaries of fraud? Probably, I think. So how did we end up with a system so rife with fraud?


The Secret Ballot

Having examined this issue at length, it's my opinion that election and voter fraud begins and ends with the secret ballot.

Here in the United States, all general elections are done by secret ballot, also known as the Australian Ballot. Each voter casts his ballot in secret so that no one may know how he voted (in the case of the dead voters, not even they know).

Looking back on my gradeschool (government school) days, I remember my teachers talking about the secret ballot as something to be revered, or even worshipped. I was taught the secret ballot is a hard-won freedom which guarantees no one can pressure or compel us to vote a certain way. Heck, the way they talked, the secret ballot was more important than any of the rights mentioned in the Bill of Rights. It was drilled into me from an early age that the secret ballot was a Sacred Truth, never to be questioned.

I believe it is long past time we ask questions. Are there other ways to vote? Why is the secret ballot also called the Australian Ballot, and how did we come to use this system?

There are many different ways of deciding elections, and at least several of them have been used in America. These are easy for you to research yourself if you have a mind to, so I won't belabor them here.

Originally, the most common way to vote in America was to show up on election day at your local town hall. At the appointed time a voice vote was called. Everyone in attendance could look around and see for themselves how everyone voted. If the count was not obvious, someone would move for a count of raised hands.

The townships reported their winners to the counties, who reported their winners to the states who, in the case of national offices, finally reported to the federal government.

Fraud within such a system was next to impossible.

However, as you will read if you begin studying the issue, there were many cases of intimidation and violence. Employers pressured employees to vote a certain way, with bonuses sometimes promised for "doing the right thing". Some employees might have even been fired for voting against their employer's wishes. If you were late on your mortgage payments, your banker might give you grace if you voted his way, or foreclose if you didn't. Strongarm tactics were sometimes used at voting places, to discourage people with unpopular opinions from casting their votes.

It was in 1856 that Australia implemented secret ballots in their elections. Actually I believe it more correct to say that in 1856 the British government imposed the secret ballot upon Australians. It's important to remember that between 1788 and 1868, Australia was a British prison colony. So the British implemented secret ballots, administered the elections, and thereby placed into office the candidates of their choosing. The whole thing could not be a more obvious fraud.

When the powers that be in America saw how easily Australian elections could be manipulated, they pushed and lobbied to bring the system to America. The rest is history.


The Price of Peace

Do you suppose it's possible that certain special interests may have intentionally incited violence at voting places, knowing that would influence public opinion and make a case for the secret ballot?

Recently two highly placed officials in Hillary Clinton's campaign were caught on hidden camera (thanks to Project Veritas) admitting to hiring thugs to incite violence at Donald Trump's rallies. The officials were fired, of course, but only because they were exposed. This incident would seem to answer the former question-- of course they would.

Intimidation and violence are crimes for which society has imposed criminal and civil penalties. Such offenses are open, obvious, and in-your-face. While it is not often easy to discover who hire the thugs who commit violent crimes (as in the case of Clinton's campaign staff), and prosecute them, the thugs themselves can easily be punished. These are crimes society can deal with.

Election and voter fraud are harder to catch. These crimes are largely invisible. In the case of the secret ballot, as the British knew way back in 1856, the victims usually don't even know they are victims.

When Americans traded honest elections for a secret ballot, they may not have known the degree to which they would ultimately be defrauded. But I'm sure they thought they were at least purchasing peace-- freedom from intimidation and violence.

What they didn't count on is that over time, the ability to swing elections in favor of the increasingly corrupt and criminal elements of our society can only lead to more intimidation, more violence, less security, and the loss not only of our peace, but our every freedom. Today we are reaping the results of this policy.


A Plan for Honest Elections

I've read many plans over the years for securing elections and stopping the fraud. All those plans are missing one crucial thing: transparency. The British knew it in 1856, just as the power-elite know it now: So long as American elections use a secret ballot, the elite will control the outcome of the elections. Secrecy equals fraud. Always has, and always will.

The only honest election system is one in which every voter openly claims his vote. My plan is cheap and easy to implement. It would reduce the costs of elections to less than ten-percent of current costs, while guaranteeing an honest result.

We can have honest elections, but only if we give up the secret ballot. Here are the fine points:
  • Do away with secret ballots
  • Require ID to register.
  • Registrants must register at least 30 days prior to election.
  • Post the registration database online and make it freely available to everyone. Name and address.
  • Accept no votes before or after election day.
  • Each voter can sort by address and easily see that Aunt Millie who died ten years ago should not be voting.
  • Each voter can notice there should not be thirty-five voters using the address of that vacant house down the street, or cemetery down the block.
  • Develop a process by which voters can challenge registrations believed fraudulent. Each county has 29 days to resolve its final list of voters before election day.
  • All voting done using the Internet, on election day only. Each county provides computers at election sites, just as they provide the means to vote now. These can be generic computers, which will keep prices low.
  • If you understand public/private key encryption and want to vote from your home computer, or cast an "absentee" ballot (meaning you're away from home, even out of the country on election day), you can cast your vote securely from anywhere. Otherwise come down to the voting sites as usual to cast your vote.
  • Immediately after voting, the website generates a confirmation number, confirms the voter's identity and the votes that he cast. He gets a printed copy of this as his proof of what he did.
  • Post the preliminary results online, immediately when the polls close.
  • Make the whole national database available as a download. Anyone can put it into a spreadsheet and--
  • Each voter can verify that his own vote was recorded correctly.
  • Each voter can verify the count for himself.
  • Voters have only one day after election day to verify their own votes. Provide means for him to correct the error. Votes will not be changed except as shown on the printed receipt the voter will be required to present.
  • Final results are announced on the second day following election day.


This method will keep elections honest because it is 100% transparent. It accommodates an unlimited scale of population, while at the same time mimicking the Township Voice model in which everyone in a settlement or community can be seen and heard, openly casting his vote.

Will there be instances of intimidation and coercion? Almost certainly. Suck it up. There have always been people who try to rig the system and seize power unlawfully, and there always will be. The secret ballot did not change that, it was only driven underground. Let's dig up this stinking corpse and let the sunlight purify it as it does all things.

Incidentally, my method greatly reduces the effectiveness of strongarming at voting places, since it allows people to vote from home, or anywhere else they choose. I can envision restaurants, bars, and other places, setting up computers and staging "Voting Parties". I see competition, and that means discounts. This would encourage more people to get out and vote, since they could also get a night on the town with dinner and drinks. In any case, there would be far too many voting places to strongarm.

As to coercion from employers and banks, I have an answer for that as well.

Without corrupt elections, we will elect honest candidates. The economy will improve, and more jobs will become available. A good economy, along with information provided by the Internet, opens up competition that did not exist back in the 1800s. If your employer fires you for how you voted, get a different job, or start your own business. You'll thank him in the long run.

It's time we stood up and took back our country from the criminals who are running it. These will be the biggest stumbling block, as they were all elected by the current corrupt system. The only way to bring about change, is to change the way people think. Please share this article and help spread the word about secret ballots.


Gregory Allan is the editor of The Lawful Path, a website dedicated to helping people defend and learn about their rights.
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Re: Absolutely Honest Elections

Post by notmartha »

Very well thought out. I don't partake of the "elective franchise" so I don't really have a dog in the race, but I think I'd add one more item to your platform:

[*]Repeal 19th Amendment

Why? Because if not, the elections may be more honest if the secret ballot was removed but the divorce rates would skyrocket! :shock: That would be one very chilly Thanksgiving dinner, don't ya think?


(I'm only kinda being sarcastic...I mean, look at who Hil's supporters are...)
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Re: Absolutely Honest Elections

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Thanks, notmartha. I don't partake either, but that doesn't stop me from observing, or having an opinion.

I laughed about your Thanksgiving dinner comment. My grandparents, bless their hearts, lived into their mid-nineties. Granddad always voted Republican, a fact which he would readily advertise. Grandma always was believed to have voted Democrat, a factoid she would never openly admit, but everyone "knew."

Grandma let a lot of things Grandpa did (or didn't do) get under her skin. I've always suspected the voting thing was one of her ways of getting back at him. Sometimes thinking about the ineffectual result of always cancelling each other out, really pissed him off.

The issue of who has the right to vote has been hotly contested throughout American history, and still varies from state to state.

Voting was once limited to landowners, which restricted women mainly because they rarely owned land. In the 1820s New York dropped this requirement for white men, but retained it for blacks. My impression from the history I've read is that the underlying intent of the law, pre-19th Amendment, was not so much meant to withhold the vote from women, as it was to insure one-vote-one-household. Since the man was the Scriptural leader of the household, particularly with regard to dealing with the world outside the house, it was up to him to cast that vote.

Literacy tests were another way of restricting voting; according to Wikipedia, this was often misused to discriminate against certain groups. How much of that is re-writing history after the fact is anybody's guess.

Prisoners are still not allowed to vote in most states, and three (Florida, Kentucky, and Virginia) impose lifelong voting bans on felons. The governor of Virginia recently made news by announcing he would allow Kentucky's prisoners to vote in this upcoming election (2016), in an apparent effort to swing Virginia toward Hillary Clinton.

I personally believe the landowner restriction is not a bad one. Landowners will generally not vote to take away rights, or overtax landowners, since they'd be hurting themselves, and it is more often non-landowners who vote for re-distribution of the wealth schemes. If a landowner is an idiot he might get to cast a few votes, but he will soon lose his land before he has a chance to do too much damage.

The literacy requirement is a no-brainer. :lol: Okay, pun definitely intended. Seriously though, why should society place equal value upon the opinions of two men, one who reads and knows the issues, and another who cannot read and can barely tie his shoes?

I do not agree with stripping felons of the vote. If a man is released from prison having served his time, then his rights must be restored.

Of course I can see the potential for abuse in any of the three above examples. The rich might acquire all the land, creating an extreme oligarchy. Literacy tests might become IQ tests, too difficult for all but the higher-educated (and thus rich) to pass. Spitting on the sidewalk may eventually become a felony which, if it does not strip a man of his right to vote, may at least deprive him of a firearm.

Robert Heinlein, in his book Starship Troopers showed us a society in which only those who had performed military service could vote. His reasoning being that one could only gain the perspective of what is good for society if one had first sacrificed to serve that society.

Personally I think a lot of America's ills could be fixed with one simple voting restriction: If you have been a recipient of public assistance any time since the last election, then you cannot vote. Get off the public dole, and stay off for four years, and your voting rights are restored. That way you eliminate the freeloaders from the pool of decision-makers, and give incentive to anyone who wants to have a voice to improve themselves. This one measure would virtually eliminate people voting themselves a place at the public trough, and would have an immediate and dramatically positive effect on America's economy.
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Re: Absolutely Honest Elections

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editor wrote:I don't partake either, but that doesn't stop me from observing, or having an opinion.
But haven't you heard, 'If you don't vote, you don't have a say" from all the statists? That is probably the one benefit of a secret ballot - never having to reveal that you don't vote and dealing with all the brainless rhetoric of how "it is your duty" and "you are un-American" and "you have no right to complain if you don't vote" etc.

I agree that voting rights should be tied to land ownership. Only those with a vested interest, not the sponges of society, should have a say in that society. Of course man would find a way to corrupt that too...

No matter who has the right to vote, voters are left with the issue of only having those the elite choose to elect from.
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