Tis the season when editorial

writers and columnists traditionally exhort readers to be sure to vote,

and then tell you how.

Ain,t gonna do that. Most of

you would have no trouble figuring out my leanings, even without seeing

my campaign button the one in Hebrew characters.

What I want to do today is

exhort you to:

Study the ballot and make

your decisions ahead of time. You might even fill it out and carry it

with you that's allowed.

Come to vote at a time of

day that will inconvenience yourself and your employer least if you have

to wait.

And be gentle with the poll

workers at your precinct as well as with elections office personnel.

First item. When we went for

the class required of poll managers recently, I was stunned to see that

the ballot consists of three full columns on BOTH sides. I'm thinking,

sure, president and vice-president, an interesting Senate race, an old

friend being challenged for a county seat then I saw the ballot.

In addition to the above, there

are school board, County Commission, and juridical races (a new word for

me), plus seven constitutional amendments, four statewide referenda, and

the school bond election. (Fayetteville residents take note: You're still

not done when you're done. You gotta go vote on liquor-by-the-drink.)

Now, granted, 27 of these choices

are labeled "Vote for one" and there is only one, but in a few

cases, there are choices and you have to scan through to find them. And

true, you don't HAVE to vote when there is only one, but I'd hate to see

a post unfilled because NOBODY voted for an unopposed candidate.

As to the amendments whew!

I'm awaiting plain-English translations like the ones that should publish

elsewhere in this paper.

Some are easy: Do we want convicted

felons in the General Assembly? Should judges have more experience practicing

law? Should the Elks get ad valorem exemptions? But the one about compensation

for public safety workers is the longest uninterrupted question I think

I've ever seen, and all those indemnifications gave me the vapors. Help!

The ladies in the county elections

office warned us that an increase in registration and a surge of absentee

voters point to a huge turn-out at the polls Nov. 7, spurred, undoubtedly

and we who wield the ballpoint pens above the required legal forms will

be doing our best.

We've been sworn to neutrality

(along with our vows of silence), so don't ask us which of the candidates

is Republican and which Democrat in the nonpartisan Senatorial match.

And don't ask us to explain the 13 names listed under each pair of candidates

in the four presidential choices. They're electors, I recognize only a

half-dozen or so names, and like it or not, you're actually voting for

them to vote for your preferred candidates. (See Constitution, United

States, Amendment 12 that should clear up everything nicely.)

Now, perhaps I shouldn't dispel

the notion that the long-suffering poll workers whose phalanx you must

negotiate to get your ballot are volunteers. We are in fact paid, modestly,

but enough to remove any hint of self-sacrifice. Be civil to us, if not

actually pleasant, and I promise we will do our best to keep things moving.

Civil or not, we will still do our best, and we apologize in advance for

the inevitable snafus in this mammoth undertaking.

The county will have deployed

every voting booth it owns, but there will be times when they are filled

with voters puzzling over questions they didn't study beforehand. People

will be waiting. And no, you may not fill out your sample ballot against

the shoulders of the voter in line ahead of you the law is clear that

you must vote in privacy even if you'd rather sacrifice your secret ballot

to expediency.

You should also know this:

Your employer must give you time off from work to vote, if necessitated

So there you have it, my Election

Day Lecture 2000. I wish I could tell you when's a good time to come to

the polls, but we've long since given up trying to second-guess why voters

come in when they do. It stands to reason that the lunch hour would be

busy yet, perhaps anticipating that, often fewer voters come then than

at other times of the day.

Streamline things for us and

for yourself. Have ID ready. Have either a cheat-sheet with you, or be

very familiar with the ballot. If you have a legitimate reason to vote

absentee, do it as soon as possible the elections office is swamped this

year.

And don't wait until 6:55 p.m.

to come to the polls. It's true that if you're in line, even outside,

by 7 o,clock, you get to vote, but if for whatever reason you are at the

wrong polling place, you won't have time to drive to your correct precinct.

I'm assuming you realize that you can't just go vote any-old-where, but

only at your assigned precinct.

Archaic, I agree the whole

system is, in these days of secure Internet and telephone connections

but it's the system we've got and we have to work within it. See you on

Election Day.

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