Conservatives Should Vote Early to Ensure Victory

Early voting in my home state of Texas starts tomorrow, October 19, and runs through October 30. In many states, it has already been underway for several weeks.

Like many conservatives, I’ve always been and likely always will be a proponent of returning to the practice of having one Election Day (with exceptions for military personnel serving overseas, etc.), but this Texas voter will be at the polls early and encouraging others to do so as well. Though there are good reasons against our modern practice of a weeks-long voting period, the reality is that Democrats are taking full advantage of it. Republicans must do the same.

Why be against early voting? The reasons are easily understood. Daniel Horowitz summarized the conservative objections in an article titled “Early voting is fundamentally unfair and undermines elections” ten years ago.

Horowitz’s first point is that the Founders certainly didn’t plan on voting taking place over four to six weeks. Although Article II of the Constitution specifically designates Congress as having the power to choose which day electors give their votes in the race for President, this was widely interpreted as giving Congress the right to set a date for the election itself.

It was that understanding, Horowitz observes, that serves as the assumption behind the Presidential Election Day Act of 1845, by which Congress set election day as the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. Our early voting patterns thus are only “dubiously constitutional.”

Horowitz argues that the practical side of early voting justifies why it’s a bad idea even if one accepts the legality.

• It means that many candidates for office, particularly non-traditional or upstart candidates, are only getting off the ground by the time their voters have already voted. While Texas’s early voting period is less than two weeks, other states such as Indiana, Minnesota, and South Dakota start their early voting times in mid-September and end the day before Election Day.
• It means that states where early voting results are reported or ascertainable might well influence voters in other states.
• The New York Times and other left-leaning outlets use such information to influence the country. And, because “the Democrat base is comprised of monolithic groups,” Horowitz argues, “they can harness their GOTV machine to completely influence the perception of an election long before Election Day.”

To summarize, Horowitz quotes the legendary Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story’s Commentaries on the Constitution: “Every reason of public policy and convenience seems in favour of a fixed time of giving the electoral votes, and that it should be the same throughout the Union.”

This writer agrees with the case Horowitz laid out so cogently ten years ago. However, what should be the case does not guide our actions for what is the case right now.

Right now, according to Ballotpedia, 47 states and the District of Columbia all have some form of “no-excuse” early voting. While it is certainly satisfying to vote on the actual Election Day, it is better that conservatives vote ahead of time. Why? Well, looking at the reasons Horowitz adduces against early voting should tell us why.

Legacy Democrat media and the Democrat Party itself use early voting to shape the narrative. Right now, using the early voting data they have gathered, many of them are pushing the narrative of a “blue wave” this November.

Early voting by Republicans can tamp down this narrative, which, like the use of polling, is meant to demoralize Republicans and encourage Democratic voters to think they are finally seeing the “arc of history,” as Barack Obama liked to say, bending toward them.

Early voting by Republicans doesn’t just tamp down Democratic narratives. It signals to other Republicans—and even Independents and Democrats worried about the slew of Democratic Socialists and their allies running this year—that victory is possible if we turn out.

Early voting also ensures that the people who intend to turn out really do. One of my favorite radio hosts, Houston’s Michael Berry, reminds his audience that life happens—Election Day might well happen when one has a health problem, car trouble, or any one of a number of other problems limiting the ability to get to the polls. When you take care of voting ahead of time, you ensure your vote will count.

You can also use that early vote to encourage others you know to add theirs to yours. You can help drive them on Election Day, even if they have a different polling site from yours.

This year, President Donald Trump has been encouraging voters in many tight races to vote as if he himself were on the ballot and to vote early. Even NBC News admits that it seems to be working in places such as Georgia. Covering one of President Trump’s events there, White House correspondent Monica Alba says people she has talked to claim his “message is working.” Alba reports that Trump supporters are telling her that “their Republican friends who maybe wouldn’t have shown up to vote are heeding the President’s call, and there are record-breaking early voting numbers here in the state of Georgia.”

The old line, used often in Democrat (and criminal) strongholds such as 1960s Chicago, is, “Vote early, vote often.” While we shouldn’t vote often, voting early and telling our friends makes it likely we will multiply our votes anyway. Midterm elections are a matter of turnout. Turning out early will mean turning out more voters—and victory.