As the members of the Minnesota State Canvassing Board — with varying degrees of enthusiasm — fell in line Wednesday to reject Al Franken’s request that they count votes on improperly rejected absentee ballots in his U.S. Senate race with incumbent Norm Coleman, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie warned against leaving such problems for individual voters to contest in court:

I don’t hear huge debate that this State Canvassing Board wants to take up the question of rejected absentee ballots. At the moment it’s a non-issue. I’m really curious about how people think — let’s say it’s a thousand, let’s say it’s 500 — improperly rejected absentee ballots should get handled. Is it the view of the State Canvassing Board that they should all go to court? And which court could handle that number? Is there another option that is more cost-effective for the citizens and less stressful for the state judicial system?

At a press conference after the meeting (video), Ritchie told reporters that without some action to address the problem, there currently exists only one option for voters who believe their votes were improperly rejected. “At the moment, they have to go to court,” he said. “We can discuss whether that’s a good thing or not.”

I asked the secretary of state what he thought of allowing the responsibility for resolving the problem of wrongly rejected absentee ballots fall to individual voters. ”If there’s a thousand people having to go to court?” Ritchie let his voice drop to a stage whisper. “It’s a bad thing. … If there are 500 to 1,000 [cases], that would be crushing to the judicial system.”

Video of the canvassing board meeting after the jump.

Minnesota State Canvassing Board meeting, Nov. 26, 2008 (via The Uptake)