12 election fun facts — reading this beats biting your nails while awaiting results.
The day we thought would never get here has finally arrived: the day after Election Day 2020. No more political ads, unsolicited text messages or “I don’t normally rant on Facebook” rants from high school acquaintances who don’t seem to realize that it’s more effective for them to write to their elected officials than to 600 people they haven’t seen in 15 years. (OK, maybe we’re still in for more of those.)
As we all continue to anxiously await results of the presidential election, we thought we’d bring you 12 wild, interesting and trivia-winning election facts. Hopefully this provides a little distraction from the intensity of the race between President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden.
(1) Biden/Pence? Trump/Harris?
In what could be the most 2020 thing to happen, it is not completely out of the question — though admittedly unlikely — to split the ticket into a president and vice president of opposite parties, thanks to some interesting election laws.
Here’s how it works: If the Electoral College were to tie — 269 Biden, 269 Trump — the House of Representatives would be responsible for deciding the next president. Instead of each representative getting a vote, however, each state delegation would get one vote, regardless of the state’s size. That means that the party that holds the majority of representatives in each state would presumably be able to vote for its candidate.
While the Democrats currently control the House majority in terms of individual representatives, the majority of state delegations actually lean Republican, with 26 of the 50 states being majority Republican. But, it is not the current Congress that gets to vote — it is the next Congress (being elected today) that matters.
Deep breath — there is more. If a House vote does not produce 26 votes for any single candidate, voting continues until Inauguration Day. On Jan. 20, whomever is elected vice president becomes acting president until the House can decide.
But wait —who decides the vice president? That vote takes place in the Senate, where each senator (two from each state) gets a vote. Currently, Republicans control the Senate (53-47), though the Democrats need only to pick up a net four seats today to flip control.
There are a lot of variables at play, but the fact that there is even a scenario that exists that could create a Biden/Pence or Trump/Harris administration is simply mind blowing.
(2) Why do we vote today?
The first Tuesday in November seems kind of arbitrary for Election Day, right? Not so. When our country was founded, residents in rural America had to travel a significant distance to get to a county seat to vote.
Since traveling on Sunday (a holy day) was not expected, giving constituents Monday to travel made Tuesday an ideal day for voting. Farmers were also the driver behind selecting the month of November. It falls at a time when the fall harvest is over, but the weather is still good enough to travel.
(3) How long have women been able to vote? It’s complicated.
New Jersey allowed women to vote prior to 1807 — single women, that is. The state’s first constitution stipulated only that an inhabitant be of voting age and reside in the state for 12 months. Married women were assumed to be represented by their husbands, but single women participated in elections regularly. That was until claims of fraud — including men dressing like women and voting multiple times — caused the law to be amended and voting rights were stripped away from women. They were given to women nationwide in 1920 (though only in theory for Black women, who had to wait for the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to pass before their voices could actually be heard).
(4) A stylus or a sticker?
Although there is some dispute over exactly when they started and who started them, the coveted “I voted” sticker emerged in the late 80s. The sticker, initially intended to remind people to vote, slowly became a representation of community and pride — proof that you fulfilled your civic duty.
(5) Drinking and the polls
South Carolina was the last state in the country to lift the ban on Election Day alcohol sales. Originally intended to discourage bribery at the polls (George Washington is said to have plied voters with nearly 144 gallons of rum, punch, hard cider and beer), the late-1800s law stuck in the Palmetto State and was finally changed in 2014. In the wise words of Absolut Vodka — vote first, then drink. Cheers to that!
(6) Competitors, meet your new coworker
Up until 1804, the person who received the second most votes in a presidential election became the vice president. Take a moment to let that sink in. The ratification of the 12th Amendment changed that process, allowing for a separate vice presidential election. But it wasn’t until Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson in 1864 that the idea of presidential/vice presidential running mates came about.
(7) No, seriously, you have to vote
There are 22 countries around the world where voting is mandatory, like Australia, Costa Rica and Greece. By contrast, the United States had an abysmal 60.1% voter turnout in the 2016 presidential election — slightly down from its highest turnout in the last 50 years, which was only 61.65% in 2008.
(8) May the biggest brain win
In 1884, they weren’t just comparing candidates’ policies and opinions, they were comparing their (literal) skulls. Phrenology — a detailed study of the shape and size of the bumps on one’s head to indicate mental abilities and character — was hugely popular. Enough so that diagrams of candidates’ heads — complete with dimensions — were published in the newspaper.
(9) But first, let me take a selfie
While Justin Timberlake is rumored to have inspired the legalization of selfies while voting in Tennessee, it remains illegal to use a phone to text, email, talk, video or take pictures of completed ballots or while in the voting booth in many states — North Carolina and South Carolina are two of them.
(10) Let’s gamble on a tie-breaker
Ace of Spades for the win? That’s the case in Nevada, where caucus voting ties are broken with a deck of cards — fitting considering it is the casino capital of the world. In Iowa, a similarly arbitrary system is used — a coin toss. Honestly, a coin toss for 2020 feels about right.
(11) Shout for your candidate
Voting didn’t always take place in private voting booths, where the contents of your ballot were unknown to anyone but you. The first votes were actually cast by voice — citizens literally shouted out their vote at carnival-like voting parties (where sobriety was questionable at best). Then came signing your name under your candidate of choice, followed by grabbing a pre-printed party ticket that was color coded, so it was obvious at quick glance who you were voting for. It wasn’t until 1892 that privacy began being viewed as an important to the democratic process and “secret ballots” became standard.
(12) Vote-by-mail-only is a thing
Vote-by-mail is a new thing for many states in 2020, but for Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Utah, and Washington, all-mail elections are the norm. In fact, Oregon had its very first vote-by-mail election all the way back in 1981 — testing the system out in a county election. It expanded to larger elections across the state over the next two decades, and in 2000, Oregon held its first entirely vote-by-mail election. Voter turnout was an impressive 80%.
This story was originally published November 3, 2020 at 6:00 AM.
