On Your Honor

Part 1 of 7

Humans are the best of creatures and the worst of creatures.  We are capable of great thinking, creativity, compassion, and acts of love.  But we are equally capable of the most ugly, dishonest, and destructive actions imaginable.

So, while most of us do our best to be our best, we need limits, restrictions, and laws.  We need doors, fences, walls, locks, alarm systems, passwords, and identification cards.  We also need law enforcement, consequences, courts of law and jails.

It is unwise to trust people just because they say they can be trusted.  None of us do that in our own lives, especially on things that matter to us.  And yet, when it comes to California elections, everything is On Your Honor.  The state trusts everyone in every circumstance.  This starts with registering to vote.

The California voter registration form asks, “Are you a U.S. citizen?” 

• If someone says “yes”, the state does not check further – it takes people at their word.

• If someone says “no”, the state sends them a card, basically asking, “Do you want to change your answer?”

• If someone does not answer the question, California sets the default to “yes.”  The state makes the registration legal, without checking further.

An honor system for something as important as U.S. citizenship harms the integrity of our elections.  And the problem does not end with voter registration forms, because the state can easily register non-citizens to vote without their having to even complete these forms:

• California’s New Motor Voter law mandates the state to automatically register to vote anyone interacting with the DMV, unless the individual proactively opts out.

• When the DMV transmits driver’s license applications to the Secretary of State (SOS), the SOS may automatically register non-citizens to vote because the SOS does not have access to the DMV’s information regarding the applicant’s citizenship.

The DMV is the best source of information for citizenship, because the DMV requires new applicants to present a birth certificate or a passport to determine the type of license or ID card it will issue (one for citizens, a different type for documented non-citizens, and a third type for undocumented non-citizens). Yet state law prohibits the DMV from sharing citizenship information with any state elections official, including the SOS. So, whether someone completes a registration form or simply interacts with the DMV, elections officials have no way to check for citizenship status of registrants, even if they wanted to.  The people in charge of our elections are flying blind in a system operated purely “on your honor.”

Because of all these problems, there is no way to determine how many non-citizens are on California voter rolls, how many actively vote, or how many have their identity used by someone else to cast a vote in their name.

This system is NOT a wise way to safeguard our most fundamental right as citizens: The right to choose our representatives by fair, honest and transparent elections!

This article is the first in a series that illustrates how California’s On Your Honor system endangers the integrity of our elections. 

Stay tuned for Part 2 of this On Your Honor article series.

"THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.

Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph...." 

Thomas Paine