The current system works well. Virginians are used to the system. Please do not disenfrachise voters by changing the system ESPECIALLY in this Presidential election year. It would be seen as game-playing, and that it s huge risk for any objective neutral Board of Elections to take.  On the merits, the DMV, the banks, the lawyers who scrutinize legal instruments, and everyone else accepts a person's name/initials affixed by hand with the intent to use them as his signature. 1) a "legal name" standard is vague and cannot be applied.  What name? Whose standard? Which defining document? How many of us use the title of our birth certificate? How many of us think our driver's license is our "legal" name? Huh??  2) A signature by a man who, due to disability, cannot write his name, but places his "X" or his initials is still his signature. Are you going to disenfranchise voters with 19-20 years of education b/c they can't write their legal name?  3)  The persons who are most likely to be unable to repeat the precise hyper-technical requirements of writing a "legal" name, placing the year AGAIN on the envelope even though it is already printed there, and other counter-intuitive requirements (the proposals for which I cannot read on this website), should not be disenfranchised. I agree they are most likely the poor, those with less education or who don't read carefully or fluently, those with disabilities, those who are in communities that are not politically involvedand thus are unaware of this debate, etc.  So all of these nonsensical proposed new factors do is to redefine by brute force a "qualified electorate" that will in fact vote more conservatively, is richer, is more highly connected politically, etc.  Nothing looks worse for Virginia -- which has a horrible history of discrimiatino and unfairness in marriage laws and at the polls -- than to put these absentee ballot proposals into effect. it is a giant step backwards and I believe is politically motivated. Others will believe that too, regardless of your subjective intent..