Student Voting Guide | Connecticut
Registration
http://www.ct.gov/sots/cwp/view.asp?a=3&q=415810 (registration form available online)
The regular voter registration deadline is fourteen days before a general election, and mail applications have to be postmarked by that date.[1] The postmark deadline for a primary election is five days before the election.[2] You may also register in person with the registrar of voters until the seventh day before a general election, and up to noon the day before a primary election.[3] Finally, you can apply for a presidential ballot, which will allow you to vote for President and Vice-President, up to the close of the polls on Election Day.[4]
If you register in person, you will have to show your drivers’ license, birth certificate, or Social Security card.[5] If you do not have one of these with you, you can get another voter to swear to your identity, place of birth, age, and residence, or any other proof the elections official will accept.[6]
You can also request that elections officials come to your campus to hold a voter registration drive by getting 25 students to sign an application.[7]
You can register to vote and vote in a primary election if you will be 18 by the next general election.[8]
Residency
At School. To count as a resident under Connecticut law, you have to be a “bona fide resident.”[9] While some older cases suggest that you might have to have intent to remain in Connecticut permanently,[10] the Secretary of State’s office has said that you only need to have the “intent to remain indefinitely.”[11] Basically, if you do not know what you are going to do or you do not have definite plans to leave the state, you should be able to establish Connecticut residency.[12]
At Home. Students who lived in Connecticut before moving to another state for school, and who wish to establish or keep their Connecticut voting residency, should have no problem doing so unless they have already registered to vote in another state. Like all states, Connecticut allows students to keep their voting residency even if they move out of the county or state to attend school, and the only way you might lose this residency is by establishing residency in a new state. While registering to vote in another state is not automatically considered abandonment of residency in Connecticut, some judges or officials might view it as such.
Challenges to Residency. The local election official has the right to deny your registration on the basis of residency, or to decide you are not eligible to remain registered, but you have the right to appeal that denial to the registrars or the full board of admissions for electors in your town.[13] They will hold a hearing and make a written ruling on your residence.[14] You can appeal that decision to the State Elections Enforcement Commission, and you can also appeal the Commission’s decision in court.[15]
Your eligibility can be challenged on Election Day by partisan challengers[16], other voters, or anyone else legally in the polling place.[17] The chief poll worker will then decide whether you are eligible. If they decide you are, you can vote a regular ballot.[18] If they decide you are ineligible, you may vote by provisional ballot for federal offices and by something called a “challenged ballot” for state offices.[19] If the registrars for your town find you to be an eligible voter, your provisional ballot will be counted, but your challenged ballot will only be counted if the election is contested afterwards.[20]
Identification
If you register in person in Connecticut, you will be asked to show ID. If you are a first-time voter who registers by mail, you will have to prove your identity by either having your Connecticut driver’s license number or the last four digits of your Social Security number matched up to government databases, or providing ID when you vote in person or with your absentee ballot.[21] Acceptable ID under this rule includes a current valid photo ID, including a student ID, or a current utility bill, bank statement, government check, paycheck or government document that has your name and address.[22] Cell phone bills and student housing bills will fulfill this requirement, as will any form of pre-printed mail with your local address on it.[23] If you cannot show ID when you vote, you can vote a provisional ballot, which will be counted if you are an eligible voter.[24]
At the polls, all voters will be asked to show a preprinted ID with your name and either your address, signature, or photograph. If you do not have ID and you are not a first-time voter who registered by mail, you will be able to sign an affidavit and vote a regular ballot.[25]
Absentee Voting
http://www.longdistancevoter.org/files/voter_forms/Connecticut_absentee_english.pdf
You can vote absentee in Connecticut if you will be absent from your election district during all voting hours.[26] First-time voters can vote absentee.[27] The formal deadline for an absentee ballot application is the day before the election, but if you are mailing your ballot in you should send in your application earlier to make sure you have enough time to return your ballot.[28] Blank applications are available on the web site of the Secretary of State and at the link above.
A mailed absentee ballot must be received by close of polls Election Day.[29] If you are a first-time voter, you will have to include a copy of your ID as described above in your absentee ballot envelope.[30] Neither your application nor your ballot needs to be notarized or witnessed.
Last Updated in April 2010
[1] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-23g.
[2] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-17.
[3] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-17.
[4] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-158c(a)(2).
[5] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-20(a) (2010).
[6] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-20(b) (2010).
[7] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-19c(a).
[8] Fair Vote, “Voting Age and Registration,” available at http://www.fairvote.org/youth-preregistration-fact-sheet/.
[9] Conn. Const. Amend. Art. IX.
[10] See Mills v. Mills, 179 A. 5 (Conn. 1935).
[11] Interview with Bernard Liu, Staff Attorney, Connecticut Secretary of State (April 24, 2008).
[12] Your voting residence in Connecticut equals your domicile. Hackett v. City of New Haven, 130 A. 121 (Conn. 1925).
[13] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-31l (2010).
[14] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-31l (2010).
[15] Conn. Gen. Stat. §§ 9-31l; 4-183.
[16] Challengers are appointed by town registrars, which are partisan officers. See Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-190.
[17] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-232 (2010).
[18] Conn. Gen. Stat. §§ 9-232(a)-(b).
[19] Conn. Gen. Stat. §§ 9-232(d)-(e), 9-232l.
[20] Conn. Gen. Stat. §§ 9-232(f), 9-232(n) (2010).
[21] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-23(r).
[22] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-23(r) (2010).
[23] Interview with Bernard Liu, Staff Attorney, Connecticut Secretary of State (April 24, 2008).
[24] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-232(n) (2010).
[25] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-261.
[26] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-135(a)(2).
[27] See Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-135 (2010).
[28] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-140(b).
[29] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-140b(a).
[30] Conn. Gen. Stat. § 9-23r.
