Buying a gun, free speech, right to assembly. Each with caveats.
Appearing in front of your fellow citizens as a breathing person is central to how voting has worked for hundreds of years.
Why change it?
I agree it should be paid day off.
But those same people who don't want their first and second amendment rights to be infringed are okay with voting having high friction so a lot of people can't do it.
Standing inline with your neighbors to exercise our vote is empowering. It reminds us of our status as voters. As equals. It crosses boundaries. It's beautiful.
Sure there's cases where appearing in person isn't practical and I'm not suggesting we close the door to that. But I think it should be needs based.
There simply is no meaningful intentional voter fraud in the US.
In an even more online and disconnected world, it forces us out of our homes to stand with our neighbors in an exercise of our power.
There's a beauty to this that, when a large amount of voting is done over mail, I feel is lost.