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Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Why Democrats and liberals oppose voter ID laws

The Wall Street Journal has a smack on editorial looking at the arguments against Voter ID laws.
People in the good state of Missouri need photo identification to cash a check, board a plane or apply for food stamps. But the state Supreme Court has ruled that a photo ID requirement to vote is too great a burden on the elderly and the poor. Go figure.

Public polls consistently show that an overwhelming majority of Americans--regardless of age, race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status--favor voter ID laws. And nearly half of the nation's states have passed them. Yet a string of recent court decisions has blocked their implementation in some places, thus siding with Democrats and liberal special interest groups who would rather turn a blind eye to voter fraud.
The states writing these laws have put in all sorts of concessions for those who don't have a photo ID.
Missouri's dispute shows what's at stake and why the laws are under attack. The state passed its new voting requirements in May in response to problems at the polls in 2000 and 2004, and the IDs were made available at no charge. The law was to be implemented over a two-year period, and people who lacked proper identification would be permitted to cast a provisional vote next month.

Despite these good faith efforts to ensure legitimate ballot access, however, opponents charge that photo ID requirements are overly burdensome and tantamount to a poll tax. The Missouri Democratic Party, which challenged the law, said that while the ID itself is free, the underlying documents--such as a birth certificate--required to obtain the necessary identification cost money. And state judges were sympathetic to the argument.

In a 6-1 decision striking down the law as a violation of the state constitution, the Missouri Supreme Court said that requiring the "between 3 and 4 percent of Missourians who lack the requisite photo ID" to obtain one for voting purposes "creates a heavy burden on the fundamental right to vote." How so? "Specific Missouri voters testified that to acquire the requisite photo ID, at the very least they will have to incur the costs associated with birth certificates, which in Missouri costs $15."
The dissenting judge, Stephen Limbaugh (Rush Limbaugh's cousin), from the Missouri Supreme Court pointed out what the majority seemed to ignore - the real problem of voter fraud. As the WSJ reminds us, this is a real problem in Missouri.
But there's a reason that Democratic partisans are more interested in raising the specter of Jim Crow than in protecting the integrity of the voting process. And here's a clue: While the Missouri Supreme Court was preparing its decision earlier this month, the Kansas City Star and St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran front-page stories about the thousands of fraudulent voter registrations submitted by Acorn, a national left-wing group financed in part by organized labor.

According to the Star, Acorn's voter registration drive generated some 35,000 applications, "but thousands of them appear to be duplicates or contain dubious data." The report went on to note that "[n]ear the top of the fishy list would be a man named Mark who apparently registered seven times over a three-day period using his mother's home address and phone number." Mom told the paper he hadn't lived there in six years.

Acorn and its affiliates have been among the most active and vocal opponents of voter ID laws in Missouri and nationwide. Now we know why.
Eventually, all these laws will probably end up at the U.S. Supreme Court, which recently struck down a 9th Circuit ruling barring the implementation of Arizona's voter ID law. While the per curiam opinion striking down the 9th Circuit ruling specifically said they weren't ruling on the constitutionality of the law, they did indicate that they were receptive to the argument that voter fraud is a real problem that states are justified in addressing. They recognized that legitimate voters have their own votes diluted by voter fraud. Edward Foley offers this analysis of the Supreme Court's per curiam opinion.
Second, the Court weighed in to some extent on the topic of voter fraud, saying that it “drives honest citizens out of the democratic process and breeds distrust of our government.” (p.3) It even used the term “disenfranchisement” in explaining the significance of voter fraud: “Voters who fear their legitimate votes will be outweighed by fraudulent ones will feel disenfranchised.” (Ibid.) While explicitly recognizing that this concern must be weighed against the possibility that a voter ID requirement would keep qualified voters away from the polls, the Court clearly put the avoidance of voter fraud into the constitutional calculus to be balanced alongside the potentially disenfranchising effect of a voter ID rule.

Third, it seemed important to the Court that the available evidence indicated that Arizona’s version of an ID requirement wouldn’t necessarily act as a barrier to qualified voters. The Court pointed to the possibility of casting a conditional provisional ballot, supplemented afterward with ID. “In addition any voter who knows he or she cannot secure identification within five business days of the election has the option to vote before election day during the early voting period.” (p.2)
I hope that the Arizona case gets back to the Supreme Court quickly so as to decide once and for all if a state has the right to try to address fraud at the voting booth by requiring a photo ID for registration. The Justices seemed to be signaling that they are interested in seeing how the law plays out in reality and then to rule on what actually happens rather than what activists claim will happen. Rick Hasen points us to Justice Steven's concurrence to the unanimous per curiam opinion.
The Court's order says it expresses no opinion on the ultimate merits of the case, and Justice Stevens' concurring opinion notes that allowing the voter i.d. law to be put in place will allow the courts to evaluate issues related to possible fraud prevented by the law and possible disenfranchisement caused by the law in light of actual historical experience, rather than speculation.
Good, let's hear about the poor person in Arizona who didn't get to vote because he or she couldn't come up with a photo ID.

posted by Betsy Newmark permalink 6:46 AM 0 comments

Comments:

The Wall Street Journal has a smack on editorial looking at the arguments against Voter ID laws.

People in the good state of Missouri need photo identification to cash a check, board a plane or apply for food stamps. But the state Supreme Court has ruled that a photo ID requirement to vote is too great a burden on the elderly and the poor. Go figure.

Public polls consistently show that an overwhelming majority of Americans--regardless of age, race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status--favor voter ID laws. And nearly half of the nation's states have passed them. Yet a string of recent court decisions has blocked their implementation in some places, thus siding with Democrats and liberal special interest groups who would rather turn a blind eye to voter fraud.

The states writing these laws have put in all sorts of concessions for those who don't have a photo ID.

Missouri's dispute shows what's at stake and why the laws are under attack. The state passed its new voting requirements in May in response to problems at the polls in 2000 and 2004, and the IDs were made available at no charge. The law was to be implemented over a two-year period, and people who lacked proper identification would be permitted to cast a provisional vote next month.

Despite these good faith efforts to ensure legitimate ballot access, however, opponents charge that photo ID requirements are overly burdensome and tantamount to a poll tax. The Missouri Democratic Party, which challenged the law, said that while the ID itself is free, the underlying documents--such as a birth certificate--required to obtain the necessary identification cost money. And state judges were sympathetic to the argument.

In a 6-1 decision striking down the law as a violation of the state constitution, the Missouri Supreme Court said that requiring the "between 3 and 4 percent of Missourians who lack the requisite photo ID" to obtain one for voting purposes "creates a heavy burden on the fundamental right to vote." How so? "Specific Missouri voters testified that to acquire the requisite photo ID, at the very least they will have to incur the costs associated with birth certificates, which in Missouri costs $15."

The dissenting judge, Stephen Limbaugh (Rush Limbaugh's cousin), from the Missouri Supreme Court pointed out what the majority seemed to ignore - the real problem of voter fraud. As the WSJ reminds us, this is a real problem in Missouri.

But there's a reason that Democratic partisans are more interested in raising the specter of Jim Crow than in protecting the integrity of the voting process. And here's a clue: While the Missouri Supreme Court was preparing its decision earlier this month, the Kansas City Star and St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran front-page stories about the thousands of fraudulent voter registrations submitted by Acorn, a national left-wing group financed in part by organized labor.

According to the Star, Acorn's voter registration drive generated some 35,000 applications, "but thousands of them appear to be duplicates or contain dubious data." The report went on to note that "[n]ear the top of the fishy list would be a man named Mark who apparently registered seven times over a three-day period using his mother's home address and phone number." Mom told the paper he hadn't lived there in six years.

Acorn and its affiliates have been among the most active and vocal opponents of voter ID laws in Missouri and nationwide. Now we know why.

Eventually, all these laws will probably end up at the U.S. Supreme Court, which recently struck down a 9th Circuit ruling barring the implementation of Arizona's voter ID law. While the per curiam opinion striking down the 9th Circuit ruling specifically said they weren't ruling on the constitutionality of the law, they did indicate that they were receptive to the argument that voter fraud is a real problem that states are justified in addressing. They recognized that legitimate voters have their own votes diluted by voter fraud. Edward Foley offers this analysis of the Supreme Court's per curiam opinion.

Second, the Court weighed in to some extent on the topic of voter fraud, saying that it “drives honest citizens out of the democratic process and breeds distrust of our government.” (p.3) It even used the term “disenfranchisement” in explaining the significance of voter fraud: “Voters who fear their legitimate votes will be outweighed by fraudulent ones will feel disenfranchised.” (Ibid.) While explicitly recognizing that this concern must be weighed against the possibility that a voter ID requirement would keep qualified voters away from the polls, the Court clearly put the avoidance of voter fraud into the constitutional calculus to be balanced alongside the potentially disenfranchising effect of a voter ID rule.

Third, it seemed important to the Court that the available evidence indicated that Arizona’s version of an ID requirement wouldn’t necessarily act as a barrier to qualified voters. The Court pointed to the possibility of casting a conditional provisional ballot, supplemented afterward with ID. “In addition any voter who knows he or she cannot secure identification within five business days of the election has the option to vote before election day during the early voting period.” (p.2)

I hope that the Arizona case gets back to the Supreme Court quickly so as to decide once and for all if a state has the right to try to address fraud at the voting booth by requiring a photo ID for registration. The Justices seemed to be signaling that they are interested in seeing how the law plays out in reality and then to rule on what actually happens rather than what activists claim will happen. Rick Hasen points us to Justice Steven's concurrence to the unanimous per curiam opinion.

The Court's order says it expresses no opinion on the ultimate merits of the case, and Justice Stevens' concurring opinion notes that allowing the voter i.d. law to be put in place will allow the courts to evaluate issues related to possible fraud prevented by the law and possible disenfranchisement caused by the law in light of actual historical experience, rather than speculation.

Good, let's hear about the poor person in Arizona who didn't get to vote because he or she couldn't come up with a photo ID.

posted by Betsy Newmark permalink 6:46 AM 0 comments

Comments: Post a Comment

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Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Why Democrats and liberals oppose voter ID laws

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HOME Betsy neither necessarily uses, nor endorses, the products advertised on this site. The truth about Avesil Cheap Hosting Atlanta Bankruptcy Attorney Dallas Bankruptcy Attorney Wikio Get exclusive travel deals and book discount cheap flights Online Bachelors Degree Comments from an AP history and government teacher in Raleigh, NC. e-mail betsynewmark AT gmail.com Commissions earned from selling items through Amazon will go towards buying materials for my classes. Thank you. Site Feed		Tuesday, October 24, 2006 Why Democrats and liberals oppose voter ID laws The Wall Street Journal has a smack on editorial looking at the arguments against Voter ID laws. People in the good state of Missouri need photo identification to cash a check, board a plane or apply for food stamps. But the state Supreme Court has ruled that a photo ID requirement to vote is too great a burden on the elderly and the poor. Go figure. Public polls consistently show that an overwhelming majority of Americans--regardless of age, race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status--favor voter ID laws. And nearly half of the nation's states have passed them. Yet a string of recent court decisions has blocked their implementation in some places, thus siding with Democrats and liberal special interest groups who would rather turn a blind eye to voter fraud. The states writing these laws have put in all sorts of concessions for those who don't have a photo ID. Missouri's dispute shows what's at stake and why the laws are under attack. The state passed its new voting requirements in May in response to problems at the polls in 2000 and 2004, and the IDs were made available at no charge. The law was to be implemented over a two-year period, and people who lacked proper identification would be permitted to cast a provisional vote next month. Despite these good faith efforts to ensure legitimate ballot access, however, opponents charge that photo ID requirements are overly burdensome and tantamount to a poll tax. The Missouri Democratic Party, which challenged the law, said that while the ID itself is free, the underlying documents--such as a birth certificate--required to obtain the necessary identification cost money. And state judges were sympathetic to the argument. In a 6-1 decision striking down the law as a violation of the state constitution, the Missouri Supreme Court said that requiring the "between 3 and 4 percent of Missourians who lack the requisite photo ID" to obtain one for voting purposes "creates a heavy burden on the fundamental right to vote." How so? "Specific Missouri voters testified that to acquire the requisite photo ID, at the very least they will have to incur the costs associated with birth certificates, which in Missouri costs $15." The dissenting judge, Stephen Limbaugh (Rush Limbaugh's cousin), from the Missouri Supreme Court pointed out what the majority seemed to ignore - the real problem of voter fraud. As the WSJ reminds us, this is a real problem in Missouri. But there's a reason that Democratic partisans are more interested in raising the specter of Jim Crow than in protecting the integrity of the voting process. And here's a clue: While the Missouri Supreme Court was preparing its decision earlier this month, the Kansas City Star and St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran front-page stories about the thousands of fraudulent voter registrations submitted by Acorn, a national left-wing group financed in part by organized labor. According to the Star, Acorn's voter registration drive generated some 35,000 applications, "but thousands of them appear to be duplicates or contain dubious data." The report went on to note that "[n]ear the top of the fishy list would be a man named Mark who apparently registered seven times over a three-day period using his mother's home address and phone number." Mom told the paper he hadn't lived there in six years. Acorn and its affiliates have been among the most active and vocal opponents of voter ID laws in Missouri and nationwide. Now we know why. Eventually, all these laws will probably end up at the U.S. Supreme Court, which recently struck down a 9th Circuit ruling barring the implementation of Arizona's voter ID law. While the per curiam opinion striking down the 9th Circuit ruling specifically said they weren't ruling on the constitutionality of the law, they did indicate that they were receptive to the argument that voter fraud is a real problem that states are justified in addressing. They recognized that legitimate voters have their own votes diluted by voter fraud. Edward Foley offers this analysis of the Supreme Court's per curiam opinion. Second, the Court weighed in to some extent on the topic of voter fraud, saying that it “drives honest citizens out of the democratic process and breeds distrust of our government.” (p.3) It even used the term “disenfranchisement” in explaining the significance of voter fraud: “Voters who fear their legitimate votes will be outweighed by fraudulent ones will feel disenfranchised.” (Ibid.) While explicitly recognizing that this concern must be weighed against the possibility that a voter ID requirement would keep qualified voters away from the polls, the Court clearly put the avoidance of voter fraud into the constitutional calculus to be balanced alongside the potentially disenfranchising effect of a voter ID rule. Third, it seemed important to the Court that the available evidence indicated that Arizona’s version of an ID requirement wouldn’t necessarily act as a barrier to qualified voters. The Court pointed to the possibility of casting a conditional provisional ballot, supplemented afterward with ID. “In addition any voter who knows he or she cannot secure identification within five business days of the election has the option to vote before election day during the early voting period.” (p.2) I hope that the Arizona case gets back to the Supreme Court quickly so as to decide once and for all if a state has the right to try to address fraud at the voting booth by requiring a photo ID for registration. The Justices seemed to be signaling that they are interested in seeing how the law plays out in reality and then to rule on what actually happens rather than what activists claim will happen. Rick Hasen points us to Justice Steven's concurrence to the unanimous per curiam opinion. The Court's order says it expresses no opinion on the ultimate merits of the case, and Justice Stevens' concurring opinion notes that allowing the voter i.d. law to be put in place will allow the courts to evaluate issues related to possible fraud prevented by the law and possible disenfranchisement caused by the law in light of actual historical experience, rather than speculation. Good, let's hear about the poor person in Arizona who didn't get to vote because he or she couldn't come up with a photo ID. posted by Betsy Newmark permalink 6:46 AM 0 comments Comments: The Wall Street Journal has a smack on editorial looking at the arguments against Voter ID laws. People in the good state of Missouri need photo identification to cash a check, board a plane or apply for food stamps. But the state Supreme Court has ruled that a photo ID requirement to vote is too great a burden on the elderly and the poor. Go figure. Public polls consistently show that an overwhelming majority of Americans--regardless of age, race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status--favor voter ID laws. And nearly half of the nation's states have passed them. Yet a string of recent court decisions has blocked their implementation in some places, thus siding with Democrats and liberal special interest groups who would rather turn a blind eye to voter fraud. The states writing these laws have put in all sorts of concessions for those who don't have a photo ID. Missouri's dispute shows what's at stake and why the laws are under attack. The state passed its new voting requirements in May in response to problems at the polls in 2000 and 2004, and the IDs were made available at no charge. The law was to be implemented over a two-year period, and people who lacked proper identification would be permitted to cast a provisional vote next month. Despite these good faith efforts to ensure legitimate ballot access, however, opponents charge that photo ID requirements are overly burdensome and tantamount to a poll tax. The Missouri Democratic Party, which challenged the law, said that while the ID itself is free, the underlying documents--such as a birth certificate--required to obtain the necessary identification cost money. And state judges were sympathetic to the argument. In a 6-1 decision striking down the law as a violation of the state constitution, the Missouri Supreme Court said that requiring the "between 3 and 4 percent of Missourians who lack the requisite photo ID" to obtain one for voting purposes "creates a heavy burden on the fundamental right to vote." How so? "Specific Missouri voters testified that to acquire the requisite photo ID, at the very least they will have to incur the costs associated with birth certificates, which in Missouri costs $15." The dissenting judge, Stephen Limbaugh (Rush Limbaugh's cousin), from the Missouri Supreme Court pointed out what the majority seemed to ignore - the real problem of voter fraud. As the WSJ reminds us, this is a real problem in Missouri. But there's a reason that Democratic partisans are more interested in raising the specter of Jim Crow than in protecting the integrity of the voting process. And here's a clue: While the Missouri Supreme Court was preparing its decision earlier this month, the Kansas City Star and St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran front-page stories about the thousands of fraudulent voter registrations submitted by Acorn, a national left-wing group financed in part by organized labor. According to the Star, Acorn's voter registration drive generated some 35,000 applications, "but thousands of them appear to be duplicates or contain dubious data." The report went on to note that "[n]ear the top of the fishy list would be a man named Mark who apparently registered seven times over a three-day period using his mother's home address and phone number." Mom told the paper he hadn't lived there in six years. Acorn and its affiliates have been among the most active and vocal opponents of voter ID laws in Missouri and nationwide. Now we know why. Eventually, all these laws will probably end up at the U.S. Supreme Court, which recently struck down a 9th Circuit ruling barring the implementation of Arizona's voter ID law. While the per curiam opinion striking down the 9th Circuit ruling specifically said they weren't ruling on the constitutionality of the law, they did indicate that they were receptive to the argument that voter fraud is a real problem that states are justified in addressing. They recognized that legitimate voters have their own votes diluted by voter fraud. Edward Foley offers this analysis of the Supreme Court's per curiam opinion. Second, the Court weighed in to some extent on the topic of voter fraud, saying that it “drives honest citizens out of the democratic process and breeds distrust of our government.” (p.3) It even used the term “disenfranchisement” in explaining the significance of voter fraud: “Voters who fear their legitimate votes will be outweighed by fraudulent ones will feel disenfranchised.” (Ibid.) While explicitly recognizing that this concern must be weighed against the possibility that a voter ID requirement would keep qualified voters away from the polls, the Court clearly put the avoidance of voter fraud into the constitutional calculus to be balanced alongside the potentially disenfranchising effect of a voter ID rule. Third, it seemed important to the Court that the available evidence indicated that Arizona’s version of an ID requirement wouldn’t necessarily act as a barrier to qualified voters. The Court pointed to the possibility of casting a conditional provisional ballot, supplemented afterward with ID. “In addition any voter who knows he or she cannot secure identification within five business days of the election has the option to vote before election day during the early voting period.” (p.2) I hope that the Arizona case gets back to the Supreme Court quickly so as to decide once and for all if a state has the right to try to address fraud at the voting booth by requiring a photo ID for registration. The Justices seemed to be signaling that they are interested in seeing how the law plays out in reality and then to rule on what actually happens rather than what activists claim will happen. Rick Hasen points us to Justice Steven's concurrence to the unanimous per curiam opinion. The Court's order says it expresses no opinion on the ultimate merits of the case, and Justice Stevens' concurring opinion notes that allowing the voter i.d. law to be put in place will allow the courts to evaluate issues related to possible fraud prevented by the law and possible disenfranchisement caused by the law in light of actual historical experience, rather than speculation. Good, let's hear about the poor person in Arizona who didn't get to vote because he or she couldn't come up with a photo ID. posted by Betsy Newmark permalink 6:46 AM 0 comments Comments: Post a Comment