United States Voting Records

[This beginner’s lesson covers time periods, content, finding aids, and how-to instructions for voting lists in the United States.

Why Use Voting Records?


 * Learn the exact years an ancestor inhabited a place.
 * Find naturalization information (information on when your ancestor became a citizen).
 * Estimate year of immigration.
 * Locate ancestor in an unindexed census (esp. state census).
 * Find other family members.

Potential Contents


 * Name
 * Birth place
 * Address
 * Years living in city, county, state
 * Whether naturalized, date, court
 * Identifying marks
 * Social Security no.

Finding Voting Records


 * Place Search - FamilySearch Catalog: Search city, county, state.

Tips


 * Use compiled records, but graduate to the originals. The originals list people in the order they registered, so they may list your ancestor registering with relatives who have different surnames. From these originals are extracted the compiled records, which list voters alphabetically.
 * Find ancestor in all available voting lists:
 * More name handles.
 * More addresses.
 * More relatives at same address.