Reply #18: Not quite true: ALL states require you to register, even Washington [View All]

[TechBear_Seattle]

But some states (like Washington) do not require that you register by party.

Voter registration laws started being put in to effect around 1880. It was not until about 1926, however, that every state had some kind of voter registration requirement. To some extent, these laws are an effort to protect the vote against fraud. Linking a voter to a specific list at a specific polling place makes it much more difficult for someone to vote twice. It also makes it much easier to exclude people who can not vote, such as non-citizens and convicted felons who have not been restored to the franchise.

The idea behind partisan registration -- requiring voters to declare allegiance to a specific political party when they register -- is to give the parties a list of sympathetic voters that they can canvass when selecting candidates for office. It also helps prevent political opponents from supporting fringe candidates that will make their own candidates look good by comparison.

The reality, however, is that voter registration laws have served to enshrine the principle of the Two Party system in American politics. Most states have very strict requirements on what parties are allowable to select on a voter registration form, and it is next to impossible for alternate parties to get well-known enough to breat through those restrictions. Until the beginning of the 20th century, third parties have routinely made a different at all levels of American politics. Since 1900, however.... Even the successes of the Libertarian, Reform and Green parties in the 1990's and 2000 election were nothing compared to the success of third parties such as the Republicans (created as a third party in 1854 to oppose the Whigs; their first candidate for President was Abraham Lincoln), the Progressives (in 1912, Progressive candidate Theodore Roosevelt got 88 Electoral votes while Republican candidate William Taft got all of 8; in 1924, Progressive William LaFollette won 13 Electoral votes and 16.6% of the popular votes), even the Socialists (in 1912, Eugene Debs got 6% of the popular vote for president; compare to Ralph Nader getting 2.7% in 2000.)

While some southern states unified briefly behind racist parties -- the Dixicrats in 1948, the American Independents in 1968 -- it would not be until 1992 and billionaire candidate Ross Perot that third parties again had an impact on the race for President. But Perot's 18.9% of the 1992 popular vote did not translate to electoral votes, and third parties had a much smaller impact in 1996, 2000 and 2004.