Reply #20: There are several voter verification technologies that may be as good as [View All]

[Edwards4President]

or superior to paper ballots, such as votemeters, modular voting architecture, and/or encrypted votes.

While limiting voter verification methods to paper trails may seem like a good idea at first blush, it effectively closes off any other technologies - either existing or likely to come into being in the future - that could be better. Interestingly, many experts - as well as the League of Women Voters and a number of civil and disability rights groups - are staunchly opposed to requiring paper trails, for several reasons, including concerns that the technology is untested and unproven and mandating paper trails does not enable voters with physical disabilities or language or literacy problems to verify their vote without compromising their right to cast a secret ballot. http://www.civilrights.org/issues/voting/Voter_Verification.pdf

Voter verification is the important goal here - paper ballots are just one way to do that. Clinton's bill takes this into account. It requires that voting systems "provide a means by which each individual voter must be able to verify his or her vote at the time the vote is cast, and shall preserve each vote within the polling place on the day of the election in a manner that ensures the security of the votes as verified for later use in any audit."

Clinton's version requires that "{a}ny method used to permit the individual voter to verify his or her vote at the time the vote is cast and before a permanent record is created shall use the most accurate technology, which may include voter-verifiable paper ballots, votemeters, modular voting architecture, and encrypted votes, in a uniform and nondiscriminatory manner."

Under Clinton's approach, if a paper trail is the best method, the locality is required to use it; if it is not, a better, more accurate system must be used. Graham's bill, on the other hand, simply mandates a paper trail, without allowing for circumstances where other, better technologies may be available.

For this reason, Clinton's bill is superior to Graham's - that's probably why Edwards co-sponsored it instead.