Every Sunday, “Back in the Day” looks at an article that ran on this date in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin. The items are verbatim, so don’t blame us today for yesteryear’s bad grammar.

Island women will carry considerable political clout when they enter the voting booths May 20 for the Constitutional Convention elections.

Registration statistics released yesterday by the lieutenant governor’s office show that females outnumber males in the registration rolls by more than 5,000 statewide.

And for perhaps the first time, the women outnumber the men in every county of the state. For the past few years, women have outnumbered male voters on Oahu, but the men have held an edge on all of the Neighbor Islands.

Only eight women, or about 10 percent, won delegate seats in the 1968 convention, in which 82 seats were available.

This year, with 102 delegates to be elected, more than 160 women are running and a sizeable number are expected to win at the polls.

Males registered to vote in the convention election number 169,787 on a statewide basis, as against 175,165 women who are registered.

The Big Island has 37,083 registered voters, with 18,404 men and 18,675 women.

Maui has 27,601 voters, including 13,762 men and 13,839 women.

Oahu has 262,588 voters, numbering 128,788 men and 133,800 women.

The total number of registered voters in the state is down fairly sharply from the high of November 1976, when a total of 363,045 voters were listed on the rolls. And on Oahu the voter registrations for the convention election are about 12,000 lower than they were two years ago.

Nevertheless, the lieutenant governor’s office yesterday said election officials are "hoping" for a healthy turnout at the polls, perhaps with more than 60 percent voting. That would produce a turnout of better than 207,000.

But other observers note that in special elections the voter turnout often drops below 50 percent, indicating a turnout of less than 170,000 on May 20.

The 51 Constitutional Convention districts in the state average about 7,000 voters in each district.