[chipperyman573]

I live in a mail-in state (WA) and in my opinion it's a pretty great system. I got my ballot almost two weeks ago and just sent it in last week. I was able to fill it out when I had free time and drop it in a ballot box (there's one about 5 minutes from where I live by foot, and I could always just mail it in if I wanted to). Lining up to vote at the polls would've been a lot more time-consuming because I would have to line up and I would've had to write down all my votes anyway, then move them onto an official ballot.

[cperciva]

I live in a mail-in state (WA) and in my opinion it's a pretty great system.

What mechanism, if any, is in place to prevent voters from being coerced or bribed to cast their vote a particular way? This is the traditional reason for using in-person voting rather than mailed ballots; if you can't show someone how you voted, they can't bribe or coerce you.

(Maybe the answer is "there is no mechanism", but increasing the ease of voting is considered more important than protecting the system from coercion and bribery. Not a tradeoff I would make, but I can see that some people would support that.)

[djrogers]

> What mechanism, if any, is in place to prevent voters from being coerced or bribed to cast their vote a particular way?

If imcoerced into voting a particular way on my mail-in ballot, I can go to the polling place in Election Day and fill out a provisional ballot hat will be counted in place of my coerced ballot. Not perfect, but this year it allows me to vote even though I'm out of the state next week.

[pseudalopex]

How many people know that? The Washington Secretary of State's FAQs don't mention coercion or bribery as reasons to receive a provisional or replacement ballot.[1][2] King County, with over 1/4 of the state's population, only mentions voting centers as an accessibility option.[3] And does the ballot tracker[4] show if a ballot is invalidated?

Every state has provisions for absentee voting, and 3/4 allow early voting in person.

[1] https://www.sos.wa.gov/elections/general-election-faqs.aspx

[2] https://www.sos.wa.gov/elections/faq_vote_by_mail.aspx

[3] http://www.kingcounty.gov/depts/elections/how-to-vote/ballot...

[4] https://info.kingcounty.gov/elections/ballottracker.aspx

[mark_edward]

I think you're guarding against different things. If you live in a society where there are (following historical patterns here) patriarchs coercing the votes of spouses and dependents you probably have a whole slew of other problems that make this particular one just part of a larger social reform that should happen anyway.