Table of contents

• Article VI: Elections And Elective Rights
  • Section 1: Qualifications Of Electors
  • Section 3: Who Disqualified
  • Section 4: Residence, Contingencies Affecting
  • Section 5: Voter — When Privileged From Arrest
  • Section 6: Ballot
  • Section 7: Registration
  • Section 8: Elections, Time Of Holding

Article VI: Elections And Elective Rights

Section 1: Qualifications Of Electors

All persons of the age of eighteen years or over who are citizens of the United States and who have lived in the state, county, and precinct thirty days immediately preceding the election at which they offer to vote, except those disqualified by Article VI, section 3 of this Constitution, shall be entitled to vote at all elections.

[ AMENDMENT 63, 1974 Senate Joint Resolution No. 143, p 807. Approved November 5, 1974.; AMENDMENT 5; AMENDMENT 2 ]

Section 3: Who Disqualified

All persons convicted of infamous crime unless restored to their civil rights and all persons while they are judicially declared mentally incompetent are excluded from the elective franchise.

[ AMENDMENT 83, 1988 House Joint Resolution No. 4231, p 1553. Approved November 8, 1988. ]

Section 4: Residence, Contingencies Affecting

For the purpose of voting and eligibility to office no person shall be deemed to have gained a residence by reason of his presence or lost it by reason of his absence, while in the civil or military service of the state or of the United States, nor while a student at any institution of learning, nor while kept at public expense at any poor-house or other asylum, nor while confined in public prison, nor while engaged in the navigation of the waters of this state or of the United States, or of the high seas.

Section 5: Voter — When Privileged From Arrest

Voters shall in all cases except treason, felony, and breach of the peace be privileged from arrest during their attendance at elections and in going to, and returning therefrom. No elector shall be required to do military duty on the day of any election except in time of war or public danger.

Section 6: Ballot

All elections shall be by ballot. The legislature shall provide for such method of voting as will secure to every elector absolute secrecy in preparing and depositing his ballot.

Section 7: Registration

The legislature shall enact a registration law, and shall require a compliance with such law before any elector shall be allowed to vote; Provided, that this provision is not compulsory upon the legislature except as to cities and towns having a population of over five hundred inhabitants. In all other cases the legislature may or may not require registration as a pre-requisite to the right to vote, and the same system of registration need not be adopted for both classes.

Section 8: Elections, Time Of Holding

The first election of county and district officers not otherwise provided for in this Constitution shall be on the Tuesday next after the first Monday in November 1890, and thereafter all elections for such officers shall be held bi-ennially on the Tuesday next succeeding the first Monday in November. The first election of all state officers not otherwise provided for in this Constitution, after the election held for the adoption of this Constitution, shall be on the Tuesday next after the first Monday in November, 1892, and the elections for such state officers shall be held in every fourth year thereafter on the Tuesday succeeding the first Monday in November.