Forty-five years ago, my junior high class visited our local post office in Hyndman, Pennsylvania. The postmaster, Harry T. “Henskie” Ritchey, taught us the newfangled, five-digit zip codes and two-letter state abbreviations that were slowly catching on after more than a decade of use.
Mr. Ritchey spoke reverently about working for the USA and about how the U.S. Post Office was in our Constitution. He had been postmaster for nearly 30 years by that point, since just after World War II when the Post Office led the country by hiring many minorities and women, helping lay the groundwork for the civil rights and women’s rights movements.
Mr. Ritchey also asked what we thought of the price of a first-class stamp, which had just risen from eight to ten cents. Back then, a dime could buy a bag of candy or a packet of baseball cards, so I said, “Ten cents seems like a lot.”
“Think about it,” Mr. Ritchey replied. “How much would you charge to take a letter from your house to a friend who lives in Maryland?” Maryland was close but still a serious trip for a kid my age. “What about a cousin in Florida? Or California?” he asked, naming far-away places I could barely imagine. “What if you had only a few days to deliver that letter and thousands more? Does ten cents still seem too much?”
“I guess not,” I marveled.
These days, I marvel in a different way when I browse social media. Donald Trump recently tweeted, “The United States cannot have all Mail In Ballots. It will be the greatest Rigged Election in history.” He ranted in another tweet, “There is NO WAY (ZERO!) that Mail-In Ballots will be anything less than substantially fraudulent.”
Trump’s insulting lies about voting and the Post Office are so egregious that Twitter fact-checked him, linking to evidence that voting by mail is not prone to fraud. Twitter’s fact-check is a good start. The Brennen Center for Justice (“The False Narrative of Vote-by-Mail Fraud”) and FactCheck.org (“More False Mail-In Ballot Claims from Trump”) have also done great work debunking lies about mail-in voting.
On Facebook, I found people mimicking Trump’s foolishness with posts like this: “We the People say no to vote-by-mail fraud!” Actually, nearly every poll shows strong majorities of “We the People” support voting by mail. Another post claimed that “We stand in line at Target, Walmart, Lowe’s, etc. We can stand in line in November. Say no to mail-in voting!” This is pure nonsense.
Every citizen should have the opportunity to vote safely and securely. Lines at retailers have nothing to do with voting. But if people insist on comparing shopping and voting, this makes more sense: “If we can get products from Target, Walmart, and Lowe’s by mail, then we can vote by mail!”
No American should have to stand in long lines to exercise the constitutional right to vote, especially with a pandemic in progress. Several states have been voting by mail for years without problems. My friends and family members in Colorado, for example, vote by mail. Their votes aren’t fraudulent.
Our military members have been voting by mail from deployments away from home since the Civil War. Our troops’ votes aren’t fraudulent. Millions of people vote absentee by mail, and their votes aren’t fraudulent. Trump himself voted by mail while president, and his primary spokespeople, Kellyanne Conway and Kayleigh McEnany, have both voted by mail in the past, yet they repeat Trump’s lies. Trump and his minions might be frauds, but their votes-by-mail are legitimate.
The Post Office makes voting easier for all Americans, especially those who live in densely populated cities and whose voting has been systematically suppressed for decades by poor transportation infrastructure, long lines, and limited polling places and voting machines. It’s no coincidence that Trump doesn’t want to promote voting by the Americans who have recently been demonstrating against racism. Just as Trump recently gassed peaceful protestors outside the White House for a ridiculous photo op, he also attacks voting-by-mail to limit the voices of Americans he sees as an obstacle to his authoritarianism.
When congressional Democrats proposed expanding mail-in voting for the upcoming election, Trump said that would mean “you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again, ” although research shows that voting-by-mail doesn’t disproportionately benefit either party. He even said in 2016, “If you’re not going to vote for me, do not vote.” That’s how a tin-pot dictator talks. Trump keeps frothing about a “rigged election” because he wants an excuse for losing in November. No president has ever so deeply misunderstood basic American values related to elections.
Two years ago, Henskie Ritchey died on his 101st birthday. I share his reverence for the Post Office, especially how that great institution can promote equal voting with safety and security during this time of pandemic and unrest. Massachusetts will allow mail-in absentee ballots for anyone concerned about in-person voting during the pandemic.
That’s how I plan to vote for Joe Biden, a candidate who supports mail-in voting and who is far more qualified to deal with pandemics and racial injustice (and everything else) than the current, temporary occupant of the bunker beneath the White House.
John Sheirer is an author and teacher who lives in Florence. His most recent book is the pandemic-themed novella, “Fever Cabin.” Find him at JohnSheirer.com.