“All animals are equal,
but some animals are more equal than others.”
George Orwell, Animal Farm
Orwell got it right. Certainly, with regard to political matters, some animals are more equal than others. I know. Because I am more equal than you. How, you ask. Because I get to vote multiple times in federal elections and you don’t. And, I don’t have to steal anyone’s identity or raise the dead in order to do so. Here’s how.
When I turned 18 in 1972, Congress just had amended the Voting Rights Act to extend the privilege of the ballot to 18 year olds. Not having graduated high school yet, I trotted down to Election Board in my home town of Oceania, where I registered to vote, appropriately using my parents’ address as mine. I was proud and still have the framed certificate my Board gave me, signed by its chairman, Winston Smith. I voted for President later that year and was excited to do so.
A couple of years later, there was a voter registration drive conducted by the Young Somethings on my college campus. I was attending a school in another state and living with my brother Napoleon, who, together with his wife Mollie, were kind enough to let me use their address to register to vote there. The girl who was behind the table at the voter registration site was pretty cute and registering seemed like a good way to get to meet her. She never asked whether I was registered anywhere else.
Two years later, I asked for and received an absentee ballot from the officials where my parents still lived (after all, I was going to be away in November) and I voted in the town where my school was located. I got two votes in that Presidential election; I felt pretty special.
Indeed, I felt so special that, when I moved to Winston-Salem (with that girl from the voter registration drive), I decided to register again. Why not “double down” on my special voting status. This year, I’m going to vote three times. My parents will send me the absentee ballot from Oceania; my brother will send me the one from my college town; and, I’ll show up in person here in Winston-Salem. It’s an important election and, maybe, with three votes in three swing states, I really can make a difference.
Pretty easy, huh? Sure, I violated a couple of laws along the way, but who really cares about the integrity of our voting system? If anyone did, the dead couldn’t vote in Chicago. Does anyone ever get prosecuted for voting twice? Does anyone ever check to see whether a person is registered in more than one place? How could they?
