Interesting - I am Registered to Vote in at Least Two States...

Over the weekend my brother asked me if I was still voting absentee in NY. I told him no. He then proceeded to tell me that I am still on the voter rolls in New York. I went to the New York State Voter Search (here) and sure enough my registration remains active.

This is crazy and a perfect example of how screwed up the US voter registration rolls are. The last time I voted in New York State was the Presidential Elections in 2000. I voted absentee as I was living in Finland at the time. In 2001 I moved back to the US and registered to vote in Virginia. In 2002 I moved to Washington, DC and Registered to vote there. Then at the end of 2005 I moved back to Virginia and registered to vote there that December. I have voted in each election and have only voted in the district where I was living. I checked to see if I was still registered to vote in DC (here) and it turns out that I am not.

It would be very simple to make voter rolls in the US much more accurate and eliminate the possibility of people being registered to vote in more than one state. All that is needed is to create a single national database based off of the Social Security database of only those who are citizens as only citizens are eligible to vote. When you go to register in a state, that state updates your registration. When a person dies, the database is updated and that person can no longer vote. This will put an end to relatives voting absentee for their recently departed family members.

If you really want to get fancy, the database can link to photos from each state's Motor Vehicle office. Bring in registration terminals to the voting locations and there is no longer a need for most people to produce photo IDs as you can check directly against the DMV photo.

Of course this does not really address many problems related to absentee ballot fraud, but it will certainly limit the possibilities for it.
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