Rich Benjamin

Why Tuesday?

Today voters go to the polls here in the Big Apple and in New Jersey and Virginia, for gubernatorial races said to be bellwethers of the 2006 mid-term elections. California voters will decide on critical initiatives on abortion notification, labor organizing, and redistricting.

The rocket scientists and politicos that I talk to haven't a clue why we're headed to the polls today (Tuesday), as opposed to tomorrow (Wednesday). In fact, Americans who do make it there probably don't know why, either.

Holding national elections on Tuesday is more like a bad habit than an informed, rational practice. Federal Election Day was established in 1845 by federal law. In those rural, agrarian years, Tuesday was a convenient day for most eligible voters -- rural workers and land-owning gentry -- to journey to the county seat and vote. Congress ruled out other days mostly by default.

But today, there are serious ramifications of holding elections on a single weekday. The average employed person works 163 more hours annually than she did 20 years ago, or the equivalent of an extra month per year. In addition to longer work days, working families are also strained providing for their off-springs' child care, education, and health care.

Polling stations are open usually from 7:00 am to 7:00 pm, allowing the majority of working Americans only one hour to make it to the polls. This forces us to ask, do the most fundamental aspects of our voting system encourage voter participation among the working poor or inhibit it?

There's a nifty, dynamic organization working to make our voting system more accessible to working Americans, starting with a direct, fundamental question: Why Tuesday?

Why Tuesday? had its launch yesterday at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. The standing-room only, bi-partisan crowd revealed an auspicious beginning for an idea whose time has come.

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Posted at 4:03 PM, Nov 08, 2005 in Democracy
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