Dumbocracy: Hundreds Try to Vote on the Wrong Day

Feb. 6, 2008— -- Hoping to vote early, vote often — or both — thousands of citizens from some of the 27 states that did not hold primaries or caucuses on Super Tuesday mistakenly turned out to cast ballots anyway. Many of them called local officials to complain their polls were closed.

Caught up in the buzz surrounding yesterday's contests — the biggest day of primary balloting in this or any previous year — voters in states like Washington, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Virginia, which won't hold primaries until later this month, showed up at shuttered polling places and called their boards of elections to complain.

Several hundred people in Florida, mostly in Palm Beach and Orange counties, contacted their county supervisors to complain they could not vote. They actually could have voted, only a week earlier when the state held its primary on Jan. 29.

"I'm hearing Super Tuesday, Super Tuesday, Super Tuesday all week and all month long. I just figured it was voting for everybody. I didn't hear anything different for Wisconsin, though I guess maybe I should have," said Ethel "Penny" Goodwin of Milwaukee, who along with half a dozen neighbors showed up at a local school yesterday at 6:30 a.m. to be first to vote.

But all is not lost. Wisconsin will hold its primary on Feb. 19.

Goodwin, a schoolteacher in her 60s, was not discouraged by her failed attempt to vote in what she called a "history-making election."

"I'll be there again on the 19th at 6:30, even though the doors don't open until 7:00. I want to take part in this history-making election. I wouldn't miss it for the world," she said.

Goodwin certainly wasn't alone in wanting to vote but getting the day wrong.

About 700 people called the Virginia Board of Elections to complain that their polling stations were closed, said Valerie Jones, the board's deputy secretary.

"We got about 700 calls from people complaining that their polling places were closed," said Jones. "We had to explain to them they were a bit premature and that our primary is not until Tuesday, February 12, and we encouraged them to vote then."