What does "election integrity" actually mean to Democrats?  A perspective is provided by the Democrat-sponsored "For the People Act" (H.R.1 in the current Congress), a dreadfully misnamed legislative mess that purports to improve election integrity and transparency.  Some of its features are:

• Mandates automatic, universal voter registration, and makes it a crime to interfere with registration

• Allows voter registration at age 16

• Mandates early voting of at least 15 days and requires paper ballots

• Restricts and impedes routine voter roll maintenance

• Prescribes strict rules for redistricting and authorizes court takeover of redistricting

• Regulates digital political advertising outright, and restricts corporate political engagement

• Requires disclosure of donors by Super PACs and so-called "dark money" groups

• Requires presidential candidates and incumbents to release 10 years of tax returns

• Supports a Constitutional amendment to overturn the Citizens United decision

• Supports statehood for the District of Columbia

You can see where this goes -- a grandiose "big picture" reform program that mostly suppresses free speech, cements Leftist influence, and protects incumbents -- but does virtually nothing to address actual, on-the-ground election integrity.

In any plain understanding, "election integrity" demands two things:  The trustworthiness of the voting process, and responsible voters.  So, what exactly does genuine election integrity look like?  And how can the election process help to ensure responsible voting?  Here are some necessary characteristics:

Citizen-Only Voting.  Allowing non-citizens to vote is, effectively, allowing foreign interference in our elections.  Illegal aliens in particular have by their action disrespected our laws and evaded any formal obligation to the nation.  The right to vote extends properly only to the nation's citizens, citizenship being a useful marker of allegiance and commitment.

Voter ID.  Affirmative identification is necessary to guarantee that only citizens vote, and only once per election.  Voter ID is often criticized as a barrier to voting designed to exclude certain segments of the population.  But, let's be real -- no legitimate voter in society today is unable to get proper identification.

Advance Registration.  Bluntly, if you can't get off your butt one time to go out to register in advance of elections, you plainly don't give a damn about participatory democracy and you simply cannot be counted as a responsible voter.  Automatic voter registration and election-day registration are detrimental to both election integrity and responsible voting.

Election-Day-Only Voting.  Same as above.  Apart from a few legitimate reasons for absence on voting day, all of which are adequately covered by absentee ballots, you need to express your commitment to participative democracy by voting in person, on voting day.  Early voting facilitates "ballot harvesting," bribery, and similar forms of vote fraud.

Election Roll Purging.  Voter lists need to be pruned of citizens who have moved, died, were convicted, or failed to vote over a period of time.  This is just basic, sound election-management practice.  Failure to maintain the accuracy and currency of election rolls opens up vast opportunities for election fraud.

These are commonsense features of a well-designed election process that can go a long way toward minimizing election abuses while advancing responsible voting.  But apart from paper ballots, you won't find Democrats supporting any of it.  Instead, Democrats seek to thwart such controls, suppress political speech, and cite money and influence as the corruptors of our elections, while in other venues they advocate for non-citizen voting "rights" and other electoral vandalisms.

One purpose of H.R.1, and the ostensible goal of free-voting advocates, is to make it "easy" to vote.  This is entirely wrong.  The goal instead must be to ensure conscientious voting, and only by legitimate voters, period.  Affirmative voter registration and in-person election-day voting are small but significant acts of citizenship that demonstrate a voter's civic commitment.  Making it easy to vote conversely invites reckless voting, enables voter manipulation and facilitates fraud -- which plausibly are the true goals of unrestricted voting.

But what about electronic voting technologies, both for voter convenience and to help prevent election fraud?  Do we really have to use "dark-ages" methods to achieve trustworthy elections?

Technology-enabled free-for-all voting can have outcomes such as Boaty McBoatface and similar absurdities.  Beyond that, so long as even facial-recognition and fingerprint authentication technologies can be compromised, there is much to be said in favor of the assurances that physical voting processes, paper ballots (which H.R.1 surprisingly supports) and in-person voting can provide, despite their archaic nature.  While you can generate thousands of bogus votes either way, electronic means of doing so are fast, low-cost, and can be difficult to trace and audit.  Hardcopy voting records are tangible proof of election results and invaluable evidence in discovering and prosecuting election fraud.  Though technology may improve over time, we cannot today afford the purported "efficiency" and "economy" of voting technology, in light of the risks and with so much at stake.

Accepting all that, shouldn't every citizen vote?  H.R.1 requires universal voter registration.  It is an almost mechanical assertion:  Isn't 100% election participation a worthy objective?

Emphatically not.

Voting without civic engagement is a dereliction of civic duty.  You can perhaps compel every citizen to vote, but you can hardly make them all vote responsibly.  The proper thing for disinterested citizens to do is not vote, something that can be largely self-selecting -- and would be, if they were left alone.  Let engaged, conscientious citizens, those whose diligence reflects their stake in the outcome, vote instead.  Others should stay home.

Of course, all law-abiding citizens have the right to vote.  But your fellow citizens have an equal right to expect that you will vote responsibly.  Responsible voting begins with a genuine interest in the substance of governance; it means being properly informed of issues and candidates, including being skeptical of personality and unpersuaded by propaganda and emotion.  It demands a knowledge of history and of the processes and institutions of government.  In short, it means civic engagement.  It means applying sober, informed judgment to electoral decisions.

Democrats of course reject such requirements or qualifications for voting, conveniently ignoring the essential connection of rights with responsibilities whenever it suits their purposes.

On-the-ground election interference has a long and ignoble history -- backroom ballot creation, voter intimidation, bribery facilitated by "walking-around money," with "vote early and often" a semi-facetious characterization of common corrupt practices.  But modern tendencies toward relaxed voting requirements, wholesale elimination of vital election controls and, more recently, voting by illegal aliens, are now presented fully above-board, unapologetically proclaimed as proper and just.  Today, any measure that has the effect of denying the vote to any individual is summarily dismissed as "discriminatory" and "racist" voter suppression.  This is patently obnoxious.  Unrestricted voting is arguably more corrupting than "big money" in our elections.  Requiring citizens to vote on their own initiative is hardly nefarious; it is honest common sense.

Finally, while elections may be the expression of the people's will, voting alone is neither the sole nor the overriding determinant of our governance.  The claim that "Hillary beat Trump" because of the popular vote total is as ignorant as it is meaningless, besides being boldfaced Leftist deceit.  Such a solitary focus on "the will of the people" and elevation of the popular vote is seductive but misguided.  The United States is constituted as a democratic republic, in which the brilliant inventions of the Senate and the Electoral College provide representation for the 50 sovereign states.  (Remember them?  They still matter.)  Every vote counts, but only in the context of limited, representative government.  In both lawmaking and the election of presidents, the popular vote is only one component of "what counts" for our self-governance.  If consistency mattered to leftists, they ought to embrace the Electoral College inasmuch as it embodies our country's authentic "diversity."  Instead, they call for its destruction.

The Founders trusted the people, but realized that effective self-governance needs engaged, informed citizens.  Enabling and respecting the will of the people requires trustworthy, responsible voting.  You have to wonder why the Democrats have a problem with that.