My Georgia Super Tuesday Experience

Since the time I turned 18, I have made it a point to vote whenever any sort of election was held. I figured it was my duty as a responsible young United States citizen. However, each and every time I went to vote something ridiculous always ended up happening to me. This includes having my parked car hit (on two different occasions) among other things. I have never once been able to simply go to my voting location, cast my vote, and go home without incident. With my history of voting disasters I decided that this year I would take every possible precaution to ensure Super Tuesday went smoothly.

On Monday night I made arrangements to ride to the polls early on Tuesday morning with my mother. We planned to arrive promptly at 7:00am so that we could be among the first voters. After speaking with my mother I ironed my four year olds favorite outfit, set the alarm clock for 6:00am, and went to sleep.

The next morning I woke to the sound of my doorbell ringing at 6:45am. Naturally the alarm clock stopped working the one day I really needed it. After letting my mother into my house I hurriedly got myself and my daughter washed and dressed. We jumped into my mothers' car and drove to our polling location at Hampton Elementary School in Hampton, Georgia.

We arrived at our polling location just before 7:30am and found ourselves standing at the end of a rather long line. In all of my years of voting, and voting disasters, this was the first time I ever had to stand in a virtually non-moving line. After awhile it became apparent that the hold up was being caused by Georgia's new Identification Card requirements. This year all voters were required to show a valid form of Government issued ID before going to vote, and the volunteers at the polls were having a hard time managing.

Our line moved at a crawl as volunteers checked IDs, made sure voters were at the right location, and had each voter fill out the required form. Until this year all volunteers had to do was ask for the name of the voter, check to make sure the voter was on the list to vote at the location in question, and then have the voter fill out a form. This year requesting IDs, and explaining the new rule to those who didn't have their Government issued ID, took up a good deal of time. Even though there were several booths set up for voting there were only one or two in use at any given time because of the massive hold up in the lines.

My mother and I finally were able to vote at about 8:05am, after waiting in line for just over 30 minutes. We each went to a booth and as I entered mine I noticed an older gentleman looking around for help. Apparently no one had really told him how to use the voting machines. In their hurry to get people through the line the volunteers had not been able to take the time to demonstrate how to use the booths to the man (or anyone else). Now that he needed help he was having a hard time finding it since all of the volunteers were at the front of the location trying to deal with the line back up.

For me the actual voting process only took a few moments. My toddler was extremely impressed by the buttons and by the sticker she got for "voting". As we left it seemed as though the line was moving a little smoother but there was still at least a 20 minute wait. A few people were determined to wait out the delay so that they could cast their vote. Some went as far as to call their employers and explain that they would be late for work. Unfortunately, these dedicated few were outnumbered by those who merely left the line and got in their cars to go to work. One young man told me that while he really wanted to vote he could not afford to lose his job over it.