The Software is Only Good if the Message Gets Through
Tuesday, October 3rd, 2006Can you just hear James Earl Jones saying that title? I can.
All jests aside, we are in the midst of a very touchy and serious debate over our rights to petition Congress via email. There are two key issues at stake here, as has been pointed out by Jeffrey Birnbaum of the Washington Post.
First, and most importantly, constituent email to Congress is being obstructed by Congress in two ways. Technologically, Congress has been implementing webforms and validation processes (for example, CAPCHA codes and Logic Puzzles) that are obstructing the ability of citizens to exercise their First Amendment rights to petition the government in the name of protecting Congress from SPAM. Behaviorally, Congressional staffers are apparently ignoring and sometimes deleting constituent email because they don’t believe it comes from real constituents.
Second, as a result of the technological barriers erected by Congress, there is growing evidence that the ability to deliver email to Congress via grassroots advocacy email software is being hampered. Worse, the ability grassroots advocacy software to deliver the email to Congress is uneven in a way that seems to suggest that vendors who have the resources and the will to get the messages through are succeeding, while others who lack the resources, the will, or both are failing.
