ightier than the tread of armies is the power of a bad idea whose time has come. But perhaps it isn't too late to stop one dreadful idea that is already on the march: the belief that democracy would be enhanced by allowing people to vote over the Internet.
Earlier this year, the town of Shelton, Wash., became the first to allow voters to cast ballots by computer. In Arizona's Democratic primary next March, as many as 50,000 Arizona voters will be permitted to vote by Internet from their home or office computers. Last month Iowa tested an e-vote system with online hookups at polling places.
The Pentagon plans to let several hundred overseas soldiers cast e-votes in next year's elections. Statewide on-line voting is under consideration in California, Minnesota, Virginia, and Florida - and even in Great Britain.
In a new book, ''Vote.com'' (Renaissance Books), Dick Morris bangs the drum for on-line democracy. ''In time,'' asserts Bill Clinton's erstwhile pollster, ''the Internet will replace the voting machine. It will become the ballot box.... It will be a healthy shot in the arm for a democracy increasingly devoid of passion.''
Now where have we heard that before?
In the 1970s we were told that lowering the voting age to 18 would be a healthy shot in the arm for America's disaffected democracy. Later it was motor-voter - allowing anyone to register to vote when getting a driver's license or applying for welfare - that was touted as an elixir for American democracy. Last November Oregonians approved yet another remedy - scrapping voting booths and conducting all elections by mail. ''Vote-by-mail enhances the democratic process,'' enthused Oregon's secretary of state, Phil Keisling. ''It saves money, increases participation, and helps our democratic system of government.''
Underlying all these supposed panaceas is the belief that if only voting were made easier, more people would vote. And in a country with chronically low voter turnout, the argument runs, anything that boosts voter participation is good.
Of course, none of these silver bullets has quite done the trick. Enfranchising 18-year-olds proved only that the vast majority of 18-year-olds won't vote. Motor-voter sent registrations soaring, but turnout continued to drop. In the last congressional election, only 36 percent of eligible voters cast a ballot, the lowest level in 56 years.
Perhaps vote-by-mail or Internet voting will reverse the trend. Doubtless it is easier to cast a ballot when all you have to do is lick a stamp or click a mouse. But why exactly are we so desperate for the ballots of people who won't vote unless voting is made utterly effortless? Is democratic self-rule enhanced by pandering to people who can't be bothered to get off the couch and go to a polling place once a year?
Oregon is turning Election Day into junk mail: Everyone is mailed a ballot whether they want it or not. Now Dick Morris and his ilk want to trivialize it even further by turning it into - well, into one of those ubiquitous ''interactive'' polls like the ones Morris features on his own Web site. These are the sort of polls that name Alan Keyes the runaway winner of the GOP debates and Elvis Presley as Man of the Century.
It's curious that those who believe a high voter turnout is the sine qua non of civic health never propose paying people to vote. Offer $10 to every citizen who shows up on Election Day and nonvoters would come out in droves. Better still, slap a fine on anyone who fails to vote. That would send turnout soaring, too.
Of course, bribing voters with cash would demean elections. Making the vote compulsory would be an affront to our traditions. But is it any less demeaning to keep scrounging for ways to wheedle votes out of people who couldn't care less about elections? And could there be any colder assault on tradition than to abolish the ancient practice of coming together in public to choose our leaders?
''The mechanics of voting,'' Swarthmore professor Rick Vallely writes in The New Republic, ''are still explicitly designed to remind us that, in principle, we are all equal members of a political community. On Election Day, we must leave our homes and offices, travel to a polling place, and physically mingle with people who are plainly our equals that day, no matter what other differences we have.''
There is a grave eloquence to the act of voting in public. We are so used - those of us who vote - to standing in line until it is our turn to be escorted to the voting booth that we forget how precious the rituals of Election Day really are. Think back to 1994 and those stunning scenes of black South Africans standing in endless queues, inching forward under a burning sun, waiting for the chance to cast their first votes as equal citizens. There is beauty and power in democracy made visible; we would be much the poorer without it.
Sure, we can do away with the voting booth. We can replace Election Day with mass-mailed ballots and envelopes. We can even dispense with the envelopes and reduce voting to a few clicks on the home computer. Maybe some marginal voters will bestir themselves and we'll gain a few points in turnout. But we will have lost something invaluable, and our democracy will be sorely diminished.
Jeff Jacoby is a Globe columnist.
