Why Isn't Election Day a National Holiday?

Voting is a pain in the ass. First of all, there are lines, unpredictable lines that leave some out in the November cold while they’re waiting to do their civic duty. Then, with href="http://www.propublica.org/article/everything-youve-ever-wanted-to-know-about-voter-id-laws">all of these new voter ID laws popping up, there’s all kinds of red tape. “Do I need to bring my Social Security card?” you might ask yourself. “How about my passport, a copy of my most recent utility bill, an expired library card? What’s it take to prove you’re American these days?” And inevitably, you’re going to miss some work since Election Day is always a Tuesday. For salaried employees, this is probably just annoying — or a relief depending on how much you like your job. But for hourly employees, this means lost wages. So in a way, you have to pay to vote. No wonder voter turnout is href="http://elections.gmu.edu/Turnout_2008G.html">so low.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Imagine if Election Day were a national holiday. It wouldn’t be the world’s greatest national holiday since it always falls on a Tuesday and sort of messes up the possibility of a long weekend. And seriously, if Columbus gets his own day, American democracy should get one too. Given all the hurdles voting on a work day creates, it might also actually get more people to the polls.

This is inarguably why class="caps">GOOD href="http://www.good.is/posts/take-back-tuesday-make-voting-day-a-national-holiday">is launching a campaign to get companies to close down on Election Day. Dubbed “Take Back Tuesday,” the initiative isn’t necessarily trying to lobby for an Act of Congress proclaiming the new national holiday. It’s simply imploring American businesses to close up shop on Tuesday, November 6 and give its employees the day off “in the spirit of a more engaged citizenship.” Well that sounds like fun! Why doesn’t class="caps">GOOD do this more often? What about Pocahontas Day? (This holiday does not exist but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t.) Or Nikolai Tesla’s birthday? We could call it the Teslafest. (Again, not a real holiday.) But okay, starting with Election Day makes sense.

This is not a new idea. It seems like one of these campaigns href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/10/dwight-schrute-wants-you-to-get-the-day-off-for-election-day/263420/">pops up every four years as democracy fanatics make their full-hearted attempts at making this country work better. None of these campaigns have really panned out, though, perhaps because creating a new national holiday is very expensive, as The Atlantic‘s Martin Wattenberg href="http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1998/10/should-election-day-be-a-holiday/305082/">pointed out in October 1998. After all, it leads to a lot of lost productivity, and you know somebody’s going to want to have a parade.

Nevertheless, the reason why Election Day is on a Tuesday is undeniably an arcane one. It was set in 1872 to fall on the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November for two main reasons. Sunday was completely off limits because of the sabbath, so you had to give people time to travel to the polls. With that commute in mind, Saturday didn’t make much sense, and at that point in time, it was a work day for most people anyways. Tuesday it is.

Things are a lot different now than they were in 1872. Labor laws have graced us with a weekend. href="http://www.wyomingnews.com/articles/2011/11/13/news/01top%2011-13-11.txt">Fewer and fewer Americans are going to church, but even for those who do, we now have this terrific new invention called the automobile that’s turned day-long journeys into minutes-long journeys. But if creating a new national holiday is out of the question, what’s the alternative? Back to Wattenberg:

A solution would be to move Election Day to the second Tuesday of November and combine it with Veterans’ Day, traditionally celebrated on November 11. This would send a strong signal about the importance our country attaches to voting. And what better way could there be to honor those who fought for democratic rights than for Americans to vote on what could become known as Veterans’ Democracy Day?

Then, of course, there’s the class="caps">GOOD option which puts the onus on the private sector. The “Take Back Tuesday” campaign just launched this week, so it’ll take some time to see if gains any traction. They’ve already secured at least one celebrity spokesperson, though: Rainn Wilson from The Office. Something tells me George Clooney would’ve been a better choice.