News-Record.com

Wednesday's lead editorial.

North Carolina might have “this year’s butterfly ballot,” The New York Times asserted in an editorial Monday.

The comparison refers to Palm Beach County, Fla., in the 2000 presidential election, when a confusing ballot layout caused some people to miscast their votes. Those errors could have turned the entire election from Al Gore to George W. Bush.

What in the world is so terrible about the North Carolina ballot — possibly “the country’s worst,” according to the Times — that could produce similar turmoil? Nothing.

Yes, there is an oddity that should be changed before 2012. It was created for political reasons more than 40 years ago to pose an inconvenience for voters. It’s the provision that separates a straight-party vote from the presidential vote. If a voter casts a straight-party Democratic or Republican vote, it will not count for Barack Obama or John McCain.

In 1967, North Carolina Democrats feared losing state offices if voters who preferred Republican presidential candidates could vote the GOP ticket all the way down the ballot in one stroke. They rigged the process to require at least two strokes.

That directive should be rescinded. It simply places an unnecessary hurdle before voters who want to support all candidates of a single party. Making the change also might reduce the occurrence of presidential under-voting, which happens about twice as often in North Carolina as the national average. It’s possible some straight-party voters don’t understand they have to vote separately for president.

There could be other reasons contributing to the under-vote, however. North Carolina typically allows fewer third-party and independent presidential candidates on its ballot. In 2004, more than 1 percent of presidential votes nationally were cast for candidates other than Bush or John Kerry, but that number was fewer than 0.4 percent in North Carolina. Tar Heel voters who don’t support either the Republican or the Democrat but find fewer alternatives on the ballot may be more likely to make no presidential selection.

At any rate, North Carolina election officials are working hard to educate voters about this ballot quirk. It’s explained on the ballot, on signs at polling places and verbally at the voting tables. Few voters should be unaware.

The much greater under-vote will result from straight-party voters stopping before they reach all the nonpartisan races at the bottom of the ballot.

Despite precautions, could there be enough confusion to alter which candidate wins a close presidential race in North Carolina? Not likely. The law of averages says mistakes ought to be made in equal numbers by supporters of both Obama and McCain.

There’s little reason to think North Carolina’s ballot will produce another Palm Beach County scenario. The outcome of the presidential election here should reflect the will of the voters and nothing else.