Gertrude Walker sums up Maryland's reluctance to make voters present identification when casting ballots in one word: unbelievable.
The elections supervisor in St. Lucie County, Fla., noted that her state requires two pieces of identification from voters on Election Day.
Walker also said that Florida state legislators recently approved another law requiring voters to take a photo ID with them to the polls.
The issue of voter identification in Maryland has resurfaced after revelations last week that Kweisi Mfume, president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and possible mayoral candidate, voted in Baltimore elections while living in Baltimore County.
Although bills requiring voter identification have repeatedly failed to win approval in the state legislature, proponents point to the Mfume case as another reason to force Maryland voters to prove who they are and where they live on Election Day.
"Maryland's system is truly an honor system," said Walker, who serves as parliamentarian for the International Association of Clerks, Recorders, Elections Officials and Treasurers. "This day and age, almost everyone has identification."
A recent survey by the State Administrative Board of Election Laws showed that Maryland is not alone. Eighteen of 28 states responding said they require no identification for voters on Election Day.
Although Baltimore has lost about 33,000 voters since 1994, city election officials say it is difficult to determine how many former residents who move to surrounding counties return to vote in their old neighborhoods.
Barbara E. Jackson, the city's elections director, estimates that each election, the election board handles 500 to 1,000 calls from precinct judges in the city's 325 voting precincts trying to determine the residency status of individual voters.
"It becomes a major problem," said Jackson, who supports requiring voter identification. "It is a headache."
The last attempt to require voters to present identification failed in the state legislature last year. The bill stemmed from Republican complaints about the 1994 election, in which Democrat Gov. Parris N. Glendening defeated Republican challenger Ellen R. Sauerbrey by 6,000 votes.
A 1995 task force headed by former U.S. Attorney George Beall made several recommendations to improve the integrity of voting in the state. But efforts to make voters present identification when they cast their ballots never made the list.
