VCC Magazine Summer 2017

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Virginia C apitol Connections, Summer 2017
4
A brief history
of Virginia’s
General
Registrars
By Tracy Howard
“You’ve come a long way, baby!”
This tag line from a successful
marketing campaign was first used by the Phillip Morris Company
in 1968. Just like this “Virginia Slims” ad, Virginia had come a long
way. The late 60’s were a time of great and disparate change, the
country was often divided, and social and civic reform ruled the
decade.
Many changes had filtered across the Potomac, and the slow
but steady march for transformation had finally made its way to
Richmond. Attitudes were changing.
Supreme Court decisions and Federal Acts had rightfully
eviscerated the discriminatory clauses of Virginia’s sixty six year
old Constitution, and with it, the Commonwealth’s Election laws
under Title 24.
In Virginia however, change comes slowly, and not without
associated growing pains.
The Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act had been signed
by President Johnson; the U.S. Supreme Court over the course
of several decades had systematically dismantled discriminatory
registration and election practices.
The remnants of the “Byrd Machine” and the ratification of
the 24th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution resulted in the Old
Dominion temporarily adopting a “You can’t tell us what to do”
attitude that produced separate and often competing Federal and
State voting rolls. It was only after the U. S. Supreme Court ruled
against Virginia’s mandatory poll taxes in Harper vs. Virginia State
Board of Elections did lawmakers began to re-evaluate. (Harper v.
Virginia Board of Elections, 383 U.S. 663 (1966)
Something had to be done, and in 1968 the process of re-writing
Virginia’s election laws began. The Virginia General Assembly
mustered an election laws study commission that, in conjunction
with the work of writing a new Virginia Constitution, resulted in a
revised body of law administering the Commonwealth’s elections.
The new Election Laws were compiled into Title 24.1, enacted
by the General Assembly in 1970. Along with the articles of suffrage
of the newly proposed Virginia Constitution the revamped election
laws were revolutionary and very progressive at the time. The new
set of laws demanded uniformity in voter registration and charged
the State Board of Elections with oversight of the registrars’ offices
and practices.
GASP! Nearly everyone could register to vote! It was enough
to give grandma the vapors!
The new Constitution disallowed registration only for non-
citizenship and the legal disabilities of felony conviction and
adjudicated incompetence. Originally, a short residence requirement
of six months, and legal age of 21 years old were included only to be
changed within a year. The 26th Amendment allowed eighteen year
olds to register and in the same year a Supreme Court ruling struck
down durational residency requirements. (Dunn v. Blumstein, 405
U.S. 330 (1972)
But Virginia being Virginia, and quite set in her ways, kept
many of the well-established methods of administering her
elections. Some of these laws were enacted by Acts of Assembly
dating back to the 1880s. The somewhat unique Virginia system
of appointed Electoral Boards and Registrars was first utilized in
1884, along with standardized ballots, officers of election and pre-
registration requirements.
But the new laws did make several significant changes, from
the new set of laws a new office emerged, the Office of the General
Registrar.
The General Registrar was the centralized replacement for
a registrar of voters in every precinct. Beginning in 1971 each
Virginia locality relied on the General Registrar as the single
registration official who maintained the voter rolls throughout the
locality. Later the Constitution was amended to include the office
of General Registrar. (Art II § 8)
Under the 1970 changes, the Commonwealth was the first state
to create a centralized voter database, and among the first to use the
central system to allow transfers between localities when a voter
moved. The centralized system prevented multiple registrations
and helped push Virginia to the forefront of voter list maintenance.
The General Registrar was and continues to be, the official charged
with adding, changing, transferring, and deleting voter records
from the Virginia list.
The new General Registrar would still be appointed by a three
member Electoral Board, all of whom are appointed by party.
However the General Registrar wore no party label, could not
participate in party politics, could hold no other office, nor be an
employee of any elected officer.
This new paradigm was meant to create an autonomous entity,
theoretically free from the type of party control that had typically
influenced the election rolls for their own benefit. Case law in the
1980’s reinforced this independence and prohibited the practice
of removing a registrar for party affiliation when the Governor
changed. Another case prohibited the registrar’s office from being
anywhere but in a publicly accessible building.
As the legal challenges of elections grew, the office of the
registrar evolved. Each General Assembly session added language
to §24.1. The title also grew through litigation, more Federal Acts,
and a continually expanding electorate.
By 1992 §24.1 was so piecemealed and disorganized the
Virginia Code Commission undertook the
job of re-codifying the Title into the 10
separate and distinct chapters of §24.2, the
title Virginia Elections operate under today.
Virginia’s Election Laws have continued
to transform and evolve. Each year the
Virginia General Assembly will, on average,
consider 200 individual election related
bills. Since the re-codification in 1993
the 180 page §24.2 has grown to over 400
pages of Code in 2017. State law, Federal
Acts, and Court rulings continue to shape
the Commonwealth’s elections. Virginia’s
General Registrars, now also referred to as
Directors of Election, have evolved with the
law to keep Virginia’s Elections among the
Continued on next page
Legislative Counsel
John G. “Chip” Dicks
FutureLaw, LLC
1802 Bayberry Court, Suite 403
Richmond, Virginia 23226
(804) 225-5507 (Direct Dial)
(804) 225-5508 (Fax)