Bracing for record turnout in Massachusetts

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

Even before the first votes were cast this morning, lines snaked down sidewalks outside polling places across Massachusetts as the state braces for an expected record turnout of more than three million voters.

Sharron Smith-Jenkins, who is in her 40s, snapped a picture of her husband and mother-in-law as they waited to vote outside the Orchard Gardens Community Center in Roxbury, where the chance to vote for the nation's first black president appeared to be the main draw.

"This is history being made because we expect to elect [Barack] Obama," Smith-Jenkins said, with a wide smile. "We wanted to be a part of it."

There were 42 people waiting outside the community center when the polling place opened at 7 a.m. About 100 waited outside the State House on Beacon Hill, where US Senator John Kerry cast his vote with his daughter, Vanessa. In the South End, hundreds formed a line that curled around the block at Cathedral High School on Washington Street.

While some, like Josh Ruman, had to wait more than an hour before even coming close to the door, the atmosphere was more festive than frustrated.

"It's been friendly, it's been fun," said Ruman, 46, an Obama supporter who squinted his eyes in the bright morning sun. "I'm getting to meet my neighbors and it's a beautiful day."

Secretary of State William F. Galvin said that 4,220,488 people registered by the Oct. 15 deadline to vote in today's election. That is an increase of 3 percent from the last presidential contest in 2004, when 4,098,634 people registered in Massachusetts.

Although the presidential election may be the main draw, neither major party candidate spent any significant time campaigning in Massachusetts, one of the most reliably Democratic states in the country. The Bay State has not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since 1984, when it went for President Ronald Reagan over former Vice President Walter Mondale.

The most recent poll on Oct. 27-28 gave Democratic Senator Barack Obama a 17-percentage point lead over Republican Senator John McCain in a survey of 658 likely Massachusetts voters by Survey USA.

Democrat John F. Kerry is running for his fifth term in the US Senate, facing off against Republican Jeff Beatty, an Army veteran and former CIA agent who lives on Cape Cod. It is an uphill battle for Beatty, who was trailing Kerry by 24-percentage points in the Survey USA poll.

All 10 of Massachusetts representatives in the US House are also up for reelection, though none faces a significant challenge.

On the state level, one of the most watched races culminated last week, when Senator Dianne Wilkerson ended her write-in campaign in the face of federal bribery charges. Wilkerson was defeated in the Democratic primary by Sonia Chang-Diaz, a former school teacher from Jamaica Plain.

Massachusetts voters today will also decide ballot questions that propose to abolish the state income tax, decriminalize possession of an ounce or less of marijuana, and ban dog racing. Polls close tonight at 8 p.m.