Issues and Action

Empowering Voters Project: Online Access to

Voter Registration Status
Contact the League of Women Voters for More Information

The League of Women Voters of Massachusetts is encouraging the Secretary of the Commonwealth to implement regulations that would require that a voter be able to check their voter registration status online in an adequately confidential manner at least 30 days before the registration deadline for all elections. Part of making the lists confidential would entail allowing voters to check only their own information, not the information of someone else. Allowing voters to know more about their unique registration and their own voting status would increase voter turnout.

Background:  In Massachusetts, only voters in Boston can currently check their voting status online. To determine their voting status other voters must contact their local registrar whose phone lines and personnel are often overwhelmed before an election. Or voters have to check the posted lists at the registrar’s office, which many voters may not know is posted. This means that voters often do not know whether their registration information is current and if they are registered. Many people do not know how to find such information at all.

Talking Points:

• Massachusetts already has an online statewide voter registration list, as required by the Help America Vote Act. The list should be searchable online so that individuals can locate their own registration information. This will help increase voter turnout and awareness of registration status.

• Some states and localities already allow voters to confirm their registration status online. These include Georgia; North Carolina; Virginia; Champaign County, Illinois; Orange County, Florida; Utah County, Utah; and Boston.

• An MIT/Caltech Voting Technology Project report estimated that 122,000 registered Massachusetts voters in 2000 did not cast a ballot because of registration-based problems. With an accessible, online voting list, voters could check their voting status before the registration deadline and have time to correct any errors.

• Those who register to vote at a voter registration event would be able to check their own registration status online to be sure that their completed form was properly delivered and processed.