(Another letter to Kate asking her about her opinion on open source software for elections.) Kate, You mentioned on KLCC that federal law somehow prevents Open Source software from being used. That's the first I've heard of that. In fact, some jurisdictions have used Open Source software. San Lois Obispo County experimented with a straw-poll using entirely community-driven software: http://openvoting.org/blog/2008-feb-15/latest_ovc_demo_is_best_ever California's SOS is a strong advocate for open source software: http://www.truthout.org/092908VA The Open Voting Consortium hasn't pointed out any problem with federal elections. In the federal bill to require open source software, http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:H.R.2239: Section 301(a)(2) of HAVA is modified to add a requirement. There is no "amending" to remove any closed audit provision. SEC. 4. PROMOTING ACCURACY, INTEGRITY, AND SECURITY THROUGH VOTER-VERIFIED PERMANENT RECORD OR HARD COPY. (a) IN GENERAL- Section 301(a)(2) of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 (42 U.S.C. 15481(a)(2)) is amended to read as follows: ...[SAW: snip out sections A and B related to paper ballots]... `(C) SOFTWARE AND MODEMS- `(i) No voting system shall at any time contain or use undisclosed software. Any voting system containing or using software shall disclose the source code of that software to the Commission, and the Commission shall make that source code available for inspection upon request to any citizen. `(ii) No voting system shall contain any wireless communication device at all. `(iii) All software and hardware used in any electronic voting system shall be certified by laboratories accredited by the Commission as meeting the requirements of clauses (i) and (ii).'. That only adds a requirement. (Corresponding Senate bill: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:S.1980: ) I'm not aware of any federal law that prevents a local state from administering its own elections in an open manner. Secretary of State Bowen of California seems to think it only takes an assembly bill: http://www.openvotingconsortium.org/ad/bowen-apr17on852.pdf Also, New York provided certification fee exemptions for open source software. Why would they exempt something that's illegal? If you know of a federal law that would prevent this, I'd like to know so I can concentrate on the "source" of the problem.