(Sep 2, 2022)
Earlier this year, there was an important legal dispute in Germany, about whether electronic voting machines were legal for use in German government elections. The dispute was decided by the German Constitutional Court (similar to the U.S. Supreme Court), and the short answer was „no.“ Now, we have available an official English translation of the ruling. As I had been told before, the ruling really does seem to ban any kind of computing equipment from being used in German elections. The legal reasoning was interesting enough that I thought I‘d share one reflection on it. The basis for the ruling was the Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany (similar in function to the U.S. Constitution) and the principle that „all essential steps in the elections are subject to public examinability.“