On the other side, a coalition of business groups is trying to bank early votes by constituencies likely to vote for Bush, such as married women with children and white-collar professionals.
Census figures show that one out of every five managerial-level employees eligible to vote in 1996 did not, said William Miller, vice president and political director of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. "My goal is to knock that number down" by informing stressed business executives about the early voting option, he said.
That could prove critical, Republican strategist Scott Reed said, because polls show "Bush is lagging" in some battleground states. Persuading more of the president's supporters to vote, he said, could offset whatever advantage the Massachusetts senator may have with less predictable independent voters.
Creativity and knowledge of the quirks in state laws can help. In the swing state of Iowa, voters begin casting ballots as many as 40 days before the election.
Last year, several churches opposed to a riverboat gambling initiative in Cedar Rapids took advantage of a little-used provision in state law that allows adult residents who can collect 100 signatures to force election officials to set up an early voting "satellite" polling station at a location of their choice, provided the location meets certain requirements.
As congregants went to cast their early votes at the churches, one preacher told them, "Let God be your conscience," recalled Linn County Election Commissioner Linda Langenberg.
The gambling initiative lost, and Langenberg is bracing for an explosion of such requests this year. Given the big Republican advantage among voters who regularly attend worship services, Langenberg was not surprised when the state GOP told her to expect petitions to set up early polling stations at area churches. She has also received requests from union halls, a furniture store, even a bar.
"Up to now, I've had an unwritten understanding with the parties that I'll set up stations that won't favor one party over the other," she said. "I don't think it's right that special interest groups can demand that a polling place be set up for their advantage."
Other critics argue that early voting undermines a sense of community and deprives voters of crucial late-breaking information about the candidates.
In 2000, for example, George W. Bush was forced to acknowledge a 1976 arrest for drunken driving five days before the election, an admission that exit polling showed cost him some votes. But in states such as Tennessee, where Bush squeaked out a victory and more than a third of the votes were cast before Election Day, some voters did not have that information when they cast their ballots.
"As much as possible, people ought to have the same information when they go to the polls," said Curtis Gans, director of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate. "I also think going with your fellow citizens to the polling place reaffirms a sense of civic duty."
But Meredith B. Imwalle, spokeswoman for the National Association of Secretaries of State, said that view is old-fashioned. "The days of white-picket fences and going with your neighbors to the polls are gone," she said. "States are trying to make it as easy as possible in this society of two-parent working households for people to vote on their own schedule."
Oregon Deputy Secretary of State Paddy McGuire has seen another benefit -- a decline in the number of last-minute scurrilous campaign attacks. "In an 18-day Election Day period, if you launch a baseless attack early, the other side has a chance to respond, and it could backfire," he said. "And if you launch it late, if half the voters have already voted, your ability to impact the outcome of the election is substantially reduced."
