Does Your One Vote Count?
Polls. Shmolls. The only poll that counts in this highly fluid election is your vote. How important is your one vote? If we show up, values voters could make all the difference in this and virtually every election.
Certainly, with the make-up of the Electoral College, the votes for those living in swing states may well be more substantial than such states where either party has a complete advantage.
In 2000, during the time after the national election when things still hung in the balance between George W. Bush and Al Gore, the Washington Times published a history piece called "Power of One."
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They wrote:
"1645 — One vote gives Oliver Cromwell control over England.
"1649 — One vote causes Charles [I] of England to be executed….
"1825 — One vote gives John Quincy Adams the presidency….
"1868 — One vote saves Andrew Johnson's presidency from impeaching [sic].
"1876 — One vote gives Rutherford B. Hayes the presidency….
"1960 — One vote per precinct gives John F. Kennedy the presidency….
"2000 — Enough said." (Washington Times: National Weekly Edition, 11/13-19/2000, p. 6).
What do they mean by "2000 — Enough said"? I live in Broward County, Florida, the home of the "hanging chad" and "the dimpled chad." (So called because of punch-card ballots that were ambiguous as to who the vote was for.)
Bush and Gore had a very close election in 2000. It was so close that Gore was not willing to concede until there were multiple recounts of the Florida ballots.
Every count of Florida votes and every subsequent recount — no matter how liberal the source was, including the New York Times and the Miami Herald — always and consistently showed George W. Bush triumphing over Al Gore. The vote counts might have slightly varied, but there was not one scenario whereby Gore beat Bush in Florida. The Supreme Court even weighed in for the count, and Bush became our 43rd president. Bill Sammon documents all this in his book, At Any Cost.
Yet some liberals — Hillary being one of them — had the gall to say in 2002 that Bush was "selected, not elected."
To me, the most amazing aspect of that election, which underscores the whole point of this piece, is that some in the media had called the state prematurely for Al Gore, prior to the polls in the conservative Florida panhandle closing. Panama City Beach and other places there are on Central time, not Eastern time.
There were still opportunities to cast one's ballot. I once heard an estimate that George W. Bush may have lost as many as 10,000 votes that way.
People intending to vote for Bush, on their way to the polls, heard that Gore had already won; so they turned around and didn't vote. If even a fraction of those people had voted, then maybe the Florida election would not have been so close — sparing us a month of counting and re-counting.
Included also in the list above from the Washington Times was the "power of one vote" in the election of our third president in 1800.
As Mark Beliles and I point out in our book, Doubting Thomas: The Religious Life and Legacy of Thomas Jefferson: "On February 11, 1801, the House of Representatives finally determined on its 36th ballot that Jefferson would be the next president."
And we add, "This was a political cliffhanger that lasted for weeks. Jefferson beat Adams handily. But Jefferson was tied with Aaron Burr; tied ballot after tied ballot created a logjam. When Jefferson finally won, Aaron Burr became his Vice President." One vote made a huge difference.
Recently I interviewed best-selling author and speaker Bill Federer for my radio show on the subject of how important is just one vote.
He told me, "Who is the king in America? Well, our founders set it up so that the people are."
Federer went on to quote three historic American leaders, beginning with signer of the Constitution Gouverneur Morris — the man who spoke more than anyone during the Constitutional Convention: "The magistrate is not the king. The people are the king."
Supreme Court Chief Justice John Jay said, "The people are the sovereign of this country." President Lincoln said, "The people of this country are the rightful masters of both Congresses and courts."
Federer continued, "The people being the king — not to vote is to abdicate the throne. We pledge allegiance to the flag 'and to the republic, for which it stands.' A republic is the people [as] king ruling through their representatives."
Until you cast your ballot, your voice won't be heard. So, no matter what the media say, it's not over till it's over. Your vote is extremely important — if for no other reason than that you are obeying God by exercising your lawful citizenship.
