Yeah, we take things slow and laid-back here. Birth certificate? Sure, we'll make one out, but what's your hurry?
TPMMuckraker
Pa. Voter ID Opponents Expect ‘Slam Dunk Victory’ In State Trial
Ryan J. Reilly August 2, 2012, 3:02 PM 1574
Closing arguments in the trial over Pennsylvania’s voter ID law wrapped up Thursday, and opponents of the controversial law are feeling pretty good about their odds of prevailing.
“We think that the case is overwhelming, both on the facts — the factual record is just incredible — and that we’ve met the legal standard for preliminary injunction,” Penda D. Hair, co-director of the Advancement Project, told TPM. The Advancement Project — along with the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, the Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia and Arnold & Porter LLP — filed the suit on behalf of 10 Pennsylvania voters.
“The state really put up very little defense: hardly any witnesses. Mostly they just said they should be able to do this because they’re the state, and I don’t think that’s going to be sufficient when you’re talking about the state constitution’s protection of the free exercise of the franchise,” Hair said Thursday.
“We think this should be a slam dunk victory for plaintiffs which should result in a preliminary injunction,” she added.
Among the reasons they’re feeling confident (according to an Advancement Project press release): state officials admitted they underestimated the number of registered voters without acceptable photo ID, admitted the law will disenfranchise voters, admitted the law will hold different voters to different standards, admitted voters casting an absentee ballot will be able to vote without ID, Pennsylvania’s Secretary of State admitted she didn’t know details about the law’s requirements and Pennsylvania’s House majority leader made comments opponents of the law believe showed the law is politically motivated.
The law, passed by a Republican controlled legislature and signed by a Republican governor, is expected to have a major impact on heavily Democratic areas of the state like Philadelphia. Judge Robert Simpson said he would rule by August 13.
Hair told TPM that she believed the multiple witnesses in the case who would have trouble voting under the law, including a 93-year-old who marched with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., gave the public a better view of the consequences of voter ID laws, which polls indicate the majority of Americans support.
“What I would say to members of the public like myself and probably you who walk around with driver’s licenses and other IDs in our wallets is that the constitution protects everybody,” Hair said. “People need to put themselves in other peoples’ shoes and ask ‘do I really want to disenfranchise my neighbor because they don’t have the same kind of ID that I might have?’”
Separately, a panel of federal judges are expected to rule on a voter ID law in Texas, which unlike Pennsylvania is covered by Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, while a trial over South Carolina’s voter ID law is on the horizon. The Justice Department is also investigating Pennsylvania’s law under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.
“What I would say to members of the public like myself and probably you who walk around with driver’s licenses and other IDs in our wallets is that the constitution protects everybody,” Hair said. “People need to put themselves in other peoples’ shoes and ask ‘do I really want to disenfranchise my neighbor because they don’t have the same kind of ID that I might have?’”
Firefly should need to write the above at least a hundred times on an old fashion blackboard in my opinion.
I had short of going into an arm uprising had fought all laws that I feel is unfair to the best of my abilities and that include the waste of long sentences that no other advance nation in the world imposed for crimes including drugs and CP crimes.
I wish I knew what the hell you were trying to say.
Why don't you focus on the actual topic? Your obsession with Firefly is becoming rather tiresome.
Battles Over Voter ID Laws Intensify
by Corey Dade
June 2, 2012
As both parties turn to the general election, and the potentially pivotal role of minority voters, battles over voter identification and other new state election laws are intensifying.
Voting rights groups, who say the new laws discriminate against minority voters, won a key victory Thursday with a federal judge's decision to strike down portions of a Florida law that tightened rules for third-party groups that register voters. In his opinion, U.S. District Court Judge Robert L. Hinkle said:
"Together speech and voting are constitutional rights of special significance; they are the rights most protective of all others, joined in this respect by the ability to vindicate one's rights in a federal court. ...[W]hen a plaintiff loses an opportunity to register a voter, the opportunity is gone forever ... And allowing responsible organizations to conduct voter-registration drives — thus making it easier for citizens to register and vote — promotes democracy."
The ruling comes as Florida faces similar challenges to its effort to purge its voter rolls of potential noncitizens. The Justice Department has filed suit to stop the practice, arguing that it violates the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which protects minorities, and the 1993 National Voter Registration Act, which governs voter purges.
The Tampa Bay Times reported that Florida officials are considering fighting the lawsuit:
"We are firmly committed to doing the right thing and preventing ineligible voters from being able to cast a ballot," said Chris Cate, spokesman for Secretary of State Ken Detzner.
Florida also has been criticized for reversing rules that had made it easier for former felons to vote.
Since 2008, controversial changes to state election laws have spread across the nation to restrict voter registration drives, scale back early voting periods or stop people from registering to vote on Election Day. Before the changes, all three practices were credited with helping to increase the young and minority voter turnout in 2008 that elected President Obama.
Young and minority voters are expected to again be key in this year's election. That's why Obama's re-election campaign recently launched an effort to educate voters about the new requirements.
The campaign's new website, www.gottavote.org, helps voters register, lays out legal changes in all the states, and asks lawyers to volunteer their expertise in election law.
The effort is designed mainly to address the roughly 31 states that now have laws requiring voters to present identification at the polls. About 15 of the states have adopted the strictest rules, requiring people to show state-issued photo IDs.
The voter ID and other laws are the result of a push mostly by Republicans who say they want to prevent election fraud. Democrats and voting rights activists argue that they are unnecessary because voter fraud is rare — often citing the findings of a federal panel.
Opponents also say the laws are part of a Republican strategy to suppress turnout among eligible voters — particularly the young, the poor and African-Americans — who tend to favor Democratic candidates.
The Brennan Center for Justice at New York University, which opposes the laws, says as many as 5 million voters could be turned away at the polls. About 18 percent of seniors and 25 percent of African-Americans don't have state-issued photo identification, according to the center.
The Brennan Center, which represented plaintiffs in the Florida lawsuit, found the laws have passed primarily in presidential battleground states. The voter ID states hold 171 electoral votes, or 63 percent of the 270 votes needed to win the presidency.
Voter ID advocates cite numerous polls showing strong support among both Democrats and Republicans. A Rasmussen Reports survey in April found that 73 percent of respondents believe the ID requirement isn't discriminatory.
Supporters also say voter ID laws aren't intended to discourage voters, but to protect the authenticity of their ballots. In Virginia, after Gov. Bob McDonnell signed a new voter ID bill recently, he issued an executive order directing the state to send new registration cards to every active voter.
The move by McDonnell, a Republican, is unusual among voter ID states and is widely seen as an effort to blunt accusations that the state is trying to suppress voter turnout. McDonnell wrote in his executive order:
"All eligible voters regardless of income, race, age, and other factors should be able to have equal access to the electoral process and should be made aware of any changes that may impact their ability to vote."
At the center of many of these legal challenges is Attorney General Eric Holder. His Justice Department has gone to court to overturn numerous state laws and blocked implementation of voter ID laws in states such as South Carolina. In each case, the Justice Department has argued that the laws would disenfranchise minority voters.
On Wednesday, Holder told a gathering of the Congressional Black Caucus that "both overt and subtle forms of discrimination remain all too common and have not yet been relegated to the pages of history."
Holder continued:
"If a state passes a new voting law and meets its burden of showing that the law is not discriminatory, we will follow the law and will approve that change. ... When a jurisdiction fails to meet its burden in proving that a voting change will not have a racially discriminatory effect, we will object, as we have in 15 different cases."
Critics complain that Holder is taking an unabashedly, and unethically, political stance against voter ID laws. They say that, as the nation's top law enforcement officer, Holder instead should be enforcing these laws, particularly since the Supreme Court upheld Indiana's voter ID measure in 2008.
That ruling found that requiring voters to produce identification is not unconstitutional, and that states have a "valid interest" in improving election procedures and deterring fraud. Supporters believe the decision should have settled the controversy.
On Friday, The Wall Street Journal's conservative editorial board accused Holder, who is African-American, of trying to "inflame racial antagonism":
"The United States of America has a black President whose chief law enforcement officer, Attorney General Eric Holder, is also black. They have a lot of political power. So how are they using it? Well, one way is to assert to black audiences that voter ID laws are really attempts to disenfranchise black Americans. And liberals think Donald Trump's birther fantasies are offensive?"
"... The two most powerful men in America are black, two of the last three Secretaries of State were black, numerous corporate CEOs and other executives are black, and minorities of many races now win statewide elections in states that belonged to the Confederacy, but the AG implies that Jim Crow is on the cusp of a comeback."
The editorial says Holder's strategy is to scare minorities into seeing voter ID laws as a threat, hopefully energizing them to turn out for Obama in large numbers in November.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2012/06/02/154152507/battles-over-voter-id-laws-intensify
But what I really object to is the attribution of racist views or attitudes to those who have supported these voter ID laws, and the characterization of such laws as being incarnations of "Jim Crow" discrimination tactics.
...
This entire issue is all about partisan politics. And I'm not the only one viewing it that way.
I think the piece of the puzzle that you're missing is that the Jim Crow laws were all about partisan politics, too.
Some examples of Jim Crow laws are the segregation of public schools, public places, and public transportation, and the segregation of restrooms, restaurants, and drinking fountains for whites and blacks. The U.S. military was also segregated.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Crow_laws
It's not about racism; it's about political power...
The separation in practice led to conditions that tended to be inferior to those provided for white Americans, systematizing a number of economic, educational and social disadvantages.
What's he actually doing now to make sure that people in his state have no problems registering to vote, or obtaining any necessary ID to vote this November?
While the ID laws do not cause an educational disadvantage that I am aware of, it does cause an economic and social disadvantage.
It is also similar to the poll taxes and literacy tests that were used to disenfranchise black voters.
The New York Times
April 29, 2008
Supreme Court Upholds Voter Identification Law in Indiana
By DAVID STOUT
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court upheld Indiana’s voter-identification law on Monday, declaring that a requirement to produce photo identification is not unconstitutional and that the state has a “valid interest” in improving election procedures as well as deterring fraud.
In a 6-to-3 ruling in one of the most awaited election-law cases in years, the court rejected arguments that Indiana’s law imposes unjustified burdens on people who are old, poor or members of minority groups and less likely to have driver’s licenses or other acceptable forms of identification. Because Indiana’s law is considered the strictest in the country, similar laws in the other 20 or so states that have photo-identification rules would appear to have a good chance of surviving scrutiny.
The ruling, coming just eight days before the Indiana primary and at the height of a presidential election campaign, upheld rulings by a Federal District Court and the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, which had thrown out challenges to the 2005 law.
Justice John Paul Stevens, who announced the judgment of the court and wrote an opinion in which Chief John G. Roberts Jr. and Anthony M. Kennedy joined, alluded to — and brushed aside — complaints that the law benefits Republicans and works against Democrats, whose ranks are more likely to include poor people or those in minority groups.
The justifications for the law “should not be disregarded simply because partisan interests may have provided one motivation for the votes of individual legislators,” Justice Stevens wrote.
Justice Stevens and the two court members who joined him found that the Democrats and civil rights groups who attacked the law, seeking a declaration that it was unconstitutional on its face, had failed to meet the heavy burden required for such a “facial challenge” to prevail.
Perhaps, they suggested, the outcome could be different in another voter-rights case, one in which a plaintiff could show that his or her rights had been violated. That was the approach suggested by the Bush administration, whose solicitor general, Paul D. Clement, urged the court to wait for a lawsuit brought by someone was actually barred by the statute from casting a ballot.
Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. concurred in the judgment of the court, but went further in rejecting the plaintiffs’ challenge. In an opinion by Justice Scalia, the three justices said, “The law should be upheld because its overall burden is minimal and justified.”
Indiana’s law allows voters who lack photo identification to cast a provisional ballot, then appear at their county courthouse within 10 days to show identification. Chief Justice Roberts, who grew up in Indiana, said during the argument of the case in January that such requirements are not onerous. The law also makes provisions for people in nursing homes.
Justices David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer dissented. Justice Souter, in an opinion joined by Justice Ginsburg, said the Indiana law, which calls for a government-issued photo identification, like a driver’s license or passport, “threatens to impose nontrivial burdens on the voting rights of tens of thousands of the state’s citizens.”
Some Democrats have complained that those who succeeded in passing the law and fought on its behalf were citing problems that did not exist, because prosecutions for impersonating a registered voter are exceedingly rare, or non-existent. The real motivation of those behind the law was to hamper Democrats, those foes of the law have argued.
“This decision is a body blow to what America stands for — equal access to the polls,” said Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, who leads the Democrats’ Senate election efforts. Other Democrats offered similar expressions of dismay. Ken Falk, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana, which brought the case, told The Associated Press that he was “extremely disappointed.”
But Brian C. Bosma, who was speaker of the Indiana House when the law was enacted and is now the House’s Republican leader, dismissed the Democrats’ complaints. “This is only a burden for those who want to vote more than once,” Mr. Bosma said in a telephone interview from Indianapolis. “It protects everyone.”
When the case was argued before the Supreme Court in January, there was considerable back-and-forth over how much of a burden the Indiana law could be in an age when an overwhelming majority of people old enough to vote also possess a driver’s license or other form of photo identification.
There was also discussion over how much voter fraud really exists, with some suggestions that the reason it has apparently never been prosecuted in Indiana is because those who commit fraud are good at it.
But, as Justice Stevens noted, there have been flagrant examples of voter fraud in American history. He cited the 1868 New York City elections, in which a local tough who worked for Tammany’s William (Boss) Tweed explained why he liked voters to have whiskers: “When you’ve voted ’em with their whiskers on, you take ’em to a barber and scrape off the chin fringe. Then you vote ’em again with the side lilacs and a mustache. Then to a barber again, off comes the sides and you vote ’em a third time with the mustache. If that ain’t enough and the box can stand a few more ballots, clean off the mustache and vote ’em plain face.”
In 2004, Justice Stevens noted in a footnote, the hotly contested gubernatorial election in Washington State produced an investigation that turned up 19 “ghost voters” and at least one confirmed instance of voter fraud. And while Justice Stevens did not mention the elections in the career of Lyndon B. Johnson, biographers of the late president have suggested that he won at least one election in Texas in the 1940’s through ballot box-stuffing — and lost at least one the same way.
On the other hand, there is no dispute that some voting laws enacted decades ago, especially in the South, were not intended to prevent fraud but rather to keep blacks from voting.
Indiana usually goes Republican in presidential elections. Republicans control the State Senate, while Democrats hold a narrow advantage in the State House. The governor, Mitch Daniels, is a Republican. When the 2005 law was passed, Republicans controlled both houses and were unanimously behind the law — while Democrats were unanimously opposed.
Lawyers who challenged the case cited the experience of one would-be Indiana voter, Valerie Williams, who was turned away from the polling place in November 2006 by officials who told her that a telephone bill, a Social Security letter with her address and an expired driver’s license were no longer sufficient.
“Of course, I threw a fit,” she said in a January interview with The New York Times, recalling how she cast a provisional ballot which was never counted. Ms. Williams, in her early 60’s, is black — and is a Republican.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/29/washington/28cnd-scotus.html
Judge's ruling unlikely to end argument over Pennsylvania's voter ID law
August 03, 2012
By JAN MURPHY,
The Patriot-News
Minority, elderly and female voters testified about running into problems getting photo ID.
That formed the crux of the argument on the suit to derail the state’s new law requiring voters to show a photo ID. The hearing in Commonwealth Court concluded Thursday.
In two weeks, Judge Robert Simpson is expected to decide if the law will take effect for the November election or if it should be struck down because it violates the state constitution. Even Simpson expects his decision to be appealed to the politically divided six-member state Supreme Court.
The state argues that the law is a simple way to ensure fair elections. Attorneys for the state say it is constitutional because it applies to all voters. Supporters also note it has strong public support.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People of Pennsylvania and other groups are challenging the law. They say there is scant evidence of voter fraud, and the state presented no fraud cases during the hearing. Critics insist the law is a GOP effort to deter members of minority groups from voting for President Barack Obama.
Two legal analysts who followed the case closely said the stories from voters, compelling as they are, might not be enough to convince the judge to rule against the law.
“The regulation of an election always has a greater impact on some people than it has on others,” said Michael R. Dimino Sr., an associate professor of law at Widener Law’s Harrisburg campus who has co-authored a book on voting rights and election law.
“That’s true if you are talking about where to put the polling places, what you need to provide to register to vote, where you have to go to register to vote,” Dimino said. “So it’s never been enough to hold a law unconstitutional just to say, ‘I don’t want to do it,’ or ‘It’s too hard for me to do it.’¤”
The argument that the absence of proven voter fraud makes the law irrational also likely will not cut it, said Bruce Ledewitz, a Duquesne law professor with a concentration in state constitutional law.
“A lot of people think a lot of laws are unnecessary or don’t do any good or aren’t needed,” he said. “Why the hell would anyone put people to this much trouble for no reason? I think [opponents have] made a very good argument. But where should an argument like that be made? It should be made in the Legislature, not necessarily in the courts.”
Philip Benesch, an associate professor of political science at Lebanon Valley College, said he thinks it comes down to how closely Simpson follows a U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld Indiana’s voter ID law.
It also depends on whether the judge is convinced the burden the law imposes on voters is more substantial than the benefit of deterring voter fraud, Benesch said.
Although he was not closely monitoring the arguments in this case, he said hearing that possibly 1 million voters might be disenfranchised by the law is disturbing.
“I hope, given the size of the population inconvenienced by this law, that there is some judgment on delaying its implementation,” Benesch said.
The AARP wants to see the law overturned. Bill White, a representative from the AARP who was among those who never missed a day throughout the hearing, said he went into the hearing not opposed to photo IDs themselves but concerned with how the law is being implemented.
“But they have now convinced me there’s a whole lot more problems than I ever even anticipated,” he said.
White found the difficulties that people born outside Pennsylvania are having getting a copy of their birth certificate to be an eye-opener. He also spoke of the high cost of implementing the law when state dollars for other programs are scarce.
In his closing argument on Thursday, Senior Deputy Attorney General Patrick Cawley defended the law as constitutionally sound.
It requires all voters to produce a photo ID to vote and does not place a special burden on any particular class of voters, he said. Thus, it doesn’t violate the equal-protection provision in the state constitution.
In fact, he said the state lightens the burden on indigent voters by offering free IDs and has expanded the number of photo ID options.
The Legislature passed the voter ID law in March.
Those who don’t bring an ID with them to the polls will be able to cast a provisional ballot; they’ll have to produce a photo ID by the Monday after the election for their vote to count.
Opponents of the voter ID law claim that the GOP-controlled Legislature enacted the law to suppress Democratic vote in a swing state that Obama carried in 2008.
Even the state agrees there’s no proven case of voter fraud that the law is trying to prevent, critics say.
In his closing argument Witold Walczak, the ACLU of Pennsylvania’s legal director, told the judge that the number of voters without a photo ID could number around 1 million. He said the state has no idea either, since its numbers range from 500,000 to 1.5 million.
“Whichever set of figures we’re talking about, there are a lot of people who do not have photo ID,” Walczak said.
Walczak played a video clip showing House Majority Leader Mike Turzai, R-Allegheny County, boasting that the voter ID law is going to allow Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney to win Pennsylvania. Turzai’s spokesman said the comment at a state GOP gathering was taken out of context.
The suspicion of an intent to suppress Democratic Party voters — if proven — would be illegal, Ledewitz said.
“The question is if there’s proof of that,” he said. “It may very well be true. I don’t doubt it personally one bit. But it’s very hard to prove. Why would Republicans want greater regulation? They always want less. They always want government to stay out of our lives, and here in this one instance, they insist on a completely unnecessary additional step.
“Obviously they are doing it just for political reasons in my opinion,” Ledewitz said. “But that’s not proof. That’s hardball politics.”
Cawley said the people whose stories formed the basis of the opponents’ case had an acceptable form of ID or the documents to obtain one.
As for two people with disabilities that prevent them from standing around a photo license center to get their ID, he said they would be eligible to vote by absentee ballot that does not require a photo ID.
He also noted that 33 states have enacted voter ID laws since 2005, and they have not resulted in widespread disenfranchisement.
Pennsylvania’s law was based upon Indiana’s voter ID law. In the 2008 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that upheld Indiana’s voter ID law, the equal-protection principal “cuts both ways,” Cawley said.
“Just as the petitioners claim a right to free and equal opportunity to vote, every other voter has a right to free and equal elections in which their legitimate votes are not diluted by fraudulent ones,” Cawley said.
Republican strategist Charlie Gerow called the law a “common sense and logical requirement.”
Besides that, Gerow said polls indicate that two-thirds of voters support the law.
http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2012/08/judges_ruling_unlikely_to_end.html
Many of the old and poor folks I deal with during these registration drives do not have a valid photo ID; the idea that they shouldn't get a vote because of that is pure bullshit, and not a little bit of class-driven condescension. My guess is that those who push these laws have zero clue what life is like for these folks - earlier in the thread, people found it shocking that someone old wouldn't have ever had these documents. But there are millions who don't, and their voice is just as important as everyone else's.
