'Tennessee Tribune' List Of Non-Voters Stirs Controversy

By: Mark Fitzgerald Tennessee Tribune Publisher Rosetta Miller-Perry says she doesn't mind embarrassing people if it makes them do the right thing. The right thing to do, she argues, is vote in the upcoming presidential election -- so she's embarrassing hundreds of registered voters who didn't go to the polls in 2004.

In its latest edition, Miller-Perry's black-oriented Nashville weekly published the names and addresses of non-voting registered voters living in largely African-American precincts.

A local TV station interviewed several people angry about finding their names and addresses on the list, especially since they believed they had valid reasons they missed the 2004 vote.

"The tactic is dirty," one of those persons, Terrence Alexander, told a reporter in a piece that ran on WTVF NewsChannel 5 in Nashville. "I think they should have had the decency to at least call me."

Alexander, for instance, said he intended to vote but needed a ride and assistance because of a severe medical condition. "I had a ride supposed to come to get me through the election services. No one ever showed up," he said.

The list has also spurred outrage among some political bloggers, with one calling it "intimidation," or, at the least, "pseudo-intimidation."

Miller-Perry, who did not immediately return a phone message for comment Thursday, told the Nashville station that it "hurts" when registered voters don't actually vote.

"We need to live up to the civil rights that have been given to us," she said.

This is not the first time the paper has run a list of non-voting people. In a race for U.S. Senate two years ago, the list apparently encouraged registered voters to vote in the election. Miller-Perry said turnout in one district shot up to 65% from 37% in a previous election.

"Sometimes when you embarrass people they do the right thing," she said.

The right thing for the paper is expensive, however -- Miller-Perry told the station that the next time around, the Tennessee Tribune will save the "thousands of dollars" in newsprint by publishing the list online.