NY Democrats will see whether prodding the vote helps
A photograph of a voter mailer from the New York State Democratic Committee. Credit: Newsday
Long Island and state Democratic leaders fret these days about getting their registrants to the polls. They’ve seen what can happen in an “off” year when the urgency of voting wanes after a presidential election.
With Democrats holding the governor’s mansion and both state legislative houses, voter energy can belong to the dissatisfied, if only to “send a message.” In Nassau and Suffolk counties in recent years, that means a certain edge for Republicans and unaffiliated voters. For both major parties, registration does not guarantee which voters will show up or mail in ballots — or how many they will total.
The strategic goal is to create urgency before Election Day. That’s especially true for partisan players who presume that their rivals on the other side are finding their own ways — such as whipping up economic, cultural, corruption, or foreign-policy issues with varying levels of regard for facts and truth.
In this atmosphere, a recent New York Democratic Committee mailer — meant to motivate the indifferent — creates a tricky test of political marketing at a time of intensifying competition for attention of all kinds. This one, as vividly described in a Newsday story on Monday, is stamped as a “Notice” with the flip side listing whether the voter cast ballots in each of the past three years.
And it adds the message: “We will update your voting record after Election Day after confirming whether you voted.”
Depending how you wish to read it — or let your imagination run — the notice could sound like a warning that your magazine subscription or driver’s license is about to expire, or a dunning notice that you’re late on your membership dues, even though parties don't have them.
And it undoubtedly freaks out some people in an age of wariness and compromised privacy that someone would “keep track” or “check up” on an average citizen’s voting records. Sometimes people forget or do not know that whether you voted is a matter of easily accessed public record.
Those records have always been open, well before the recent revolution in information technology. That makes it a bit of hyperbole to call this “intimidation” by “Big Brother” — the cliché to which some minds instantly run.
Still, state and Nassau Democratic chairman Jay Jacobs said, “I can see why some people may find that somewhat intimidating, but it was not meant to be.” But he has reason to believe it helps turnout to a degree.
A 2008 study in the American Political Science Review talks about “shaming” and “social norms” in discussing the social pressure to vote, and in notices such as these. The social scientists Alan S. Gerber, Donald P. Green, and Christopher W. Larimer conclude: “Although we are not advocates of shaming tactics or policies, their cost-effectiveness makes them an inevitable development in political campaign craft.”
Of more concern in the long run is what you might call rhetorical inflation by both major parties. Fundraising notices warn of apocalyptic consequences for the nation, the earth, and humankind if you don’t send a modest amount of cash right now to the candidate whose marketing research suggests you would fear the “other side” winning.
This tendency to “sell-sell-sell” and “frighten-frighten-frighten” gets so heated in today’s political races that a get-out-the-vote prod, or nag, or poke from your party organization seems relatively benign.
Columnist Dan Janison's opinions are his own.
Dan Janison is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
