Each vote matters in close race

Three hundred twenty-seven people might well decide who will succeed President Bill Clinton as commander-in-chief of the United States. That's the number of students on just a few floors of a dorm on this campus. That's the number of people in one Y103, Introduction to American Politics, lecture. That's far fewer than the number of college students the IU College Democrats registered to vote this semester.\nWhile Vice President Al Gore leads the country in the popular vote by about 200,000 votes, our system of elections uses the state-centered method of the Electoral College, which disregards that number in favor of each state's overall winner.\nLet me reiterate what I said in this column on Election Day: Today we decide what direction we want the country to go. Every four years, millions of Americans choose to let someone else decide for them how much they pay in taxes, the quality of their schools, how safe the air they breathe and water they drink is and whether they have quality, affordable health care. They let someone else decide whether a woman has the right to choose, whether to enact campaign finance reform and in what direction our economy will go. We're letting someone else choose who will appoint the next few justices on the Supreme Court, who have the position for life.\nIf you didn't vote, who made your decision for you? More than half of the voters in Monroe County chose to let someone else vote for them, a lower turnout than the national average, and while turnout among IU students was up slightly from two and four years ago, it fell far short of what it should have been.\nThe lesson from this election is not about the Electoral College, which we've all heard about in great detail now from news anchors, political pundits, legal experts and average citizens. The lesson is that when it comes right down to it -- we count. We can now truly say each person's vote matters when elections are as close as this one.\nThink about it: out of more than 250 million people in this country, a few hundred might choose whether we continue on a path of prosperity, with more jobs, lower crime rates and the strongest economy ever, or whether we will go down a different path to an uncertain future.\nIt is my hope that from this election, regardless of who wins, students on this campus and throughout the United States will realize the importance of their votes and make it count in four years. \nThink how many students there are in Florida. Now think about what it would be like to have the candidates focus on issues that concern us -- such as education, jobs and the environment -- every time they travel the country seeking support.\nGore and his running mate, Sen. Joe Lieberman, have worked hard on those issues and many more that particularly concern college students. Democrats always have.\nThe results of this election are still uncertain, as we await totals from hand counts in several Florida counties. And it appears this election might be decided in the courts. Gore and Lieberman can't yet concede defeat, because they might not have been defeated.\nBut whatever the results of this election, let's give Democrats the edge they need in four years to keep the White House working for us. This election should teach us that our votes and our voices in this democracy are critically important, and in four years, we must remember that lesson.