Your vote on an issue, much like your willingness to sign a petition or to donate to a candidate, is a quintessential example of speech. I'm not referring to "free speech" in the formal sense, but in colloquial terms, meaning your ability to express yourself on matters of public import without being silenced or otherwise influenced by external forces.
Okay, fair enough.
I'm not aware of any marked chilling effect that was created by campaign contribution disclosure requirements (and I'm a lot more concerned about
that since it goes back to the potential consequences of supporting the sitting party's opposition). Big donations continue to roll in from special interests, small donations continue to roll in from grassroots efforts.
No, because that's the entire purpose behind their election. We elect them to act in the way we want them to act. Having their voting records be public is a positive thing in terms of civic engagement, as it helps us decide whether to support them in the future. I don't think my coworkers and colleagues should be looking at my voting record to determine whether or not to support me.
The basic building block for the various and sundry legislative bodies that represent our interests in this country is the elected official, for whom secret ballots are cast, and whose every official action is a matter of public record. The logic, at least for me, is very simple -- the politics by which you cast your vote for an official are your own business, but the official business in which they are involved is everyone's business.
There are all sorts of political activities where your personal information might be helpful for credibility's sake, but strictly speaking isn't relevant. Protests. Letter-writing campaigns. Membership in any politically active organization. These are activities that, in America's grand tradition of political fisticuffs, we want to encourage (or at least avoid discouraging).
Ballot initiatives, however, are an entirely different matter. For one thing, there is only one example of balloting which is not centered on elections and yet is essential to the functioning of any governing body in the U.S. -- school budgets. In this particular example, since we're talking about an essential function -- deciding how our tax dollars get spent on the local public school -- which isn't currently being decided by an elected official per se (educational standards aside), I don't think disclosure of who voted which way is a good idea.
Aside from that, my understanding is that there are no essential legislative functions which are supplied exclusively via balloting. Balloting is certainly used to change the legal landscape according to the will of the majority in a variety of places, but that isn't the only mechanism available -- elected officials can make the same changes, on the record.
What about politically sensitive subjects, the kind that elected officials won't touch with a ten-foot pole because they don't want be on the record as opposing the personal interests of this or that segment of the voting public? I can certainly understand the appeal of a functionally anonymous balloting process which permits us to express our individual wishes without concern that others will penalize us for our choice. At the same time, what we're essentially doing is allowing a simple majority to exert their will on what may well be a very large minority without having to take any responsibility for it, without having to run for office to do it, completely immune to any kind of lobbying effort. We are, furthermore, allowing them to do it when such an exertion is not a functional requirement of the structure of government, when such an exertion is not the only road by which their objectives may be achieved.
The ignomious aspects of this nation's history aside, if there's anything that the structure of the government our founders left behind should teach us, it is that the tyranny of the majority was something they tried to minimize just as much as they tried to minimize any restrictions whatsoever on political speech or political activity.
It seems to me that the one and only defense that the minority has against the anonymous will of a majority that they did not elect and cannot lobby is transparency. Leave alone highly localized balloting functions for which there is no legislative alternative and publicize the rest.