This Just In

[brynndragon]

From the you-can-never-have-too-much-good-news department:

Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out, Rummy

Comments

[tober.livejournal.com]

Please justify the claim that requiring ID in order to vote is a disguised poll tax. Do you feel the same if ID is required to register to vote and reasonable evidence of having registered to vote is required to vote?

I agree with you about signing a ballot (or any procedure that is too potentially similar to signing a ballot, such as having to submit a signature to an electronic voting machine). Also - not that you said so - but a copy of your completed ballot as a voting receipt is also a bad thing. A receipt that proves you voted is fine (although I'm not sure it's that worthwhile). A receipt that can be used to prove how you voted is not[1].

[1] Because it enables badness such as "Prove to me that you voted for x and I'll give you a cookie."

[greyhame.livejournal.com]

It was more an opinion than an assertion, so I don't think I really have to "justify" it, but here's why I think that. Additional hurdles to voting discourage people from voting, and they disproportionately discourage Black, Latino and other minority and/or non-English-speaking people from voting, because such measures have often been used (and in fact were often implemented for no other reason) to discourage minorities from voting, and because those communities know that they have. I said "poll tax" because that's a convenient shorthand for regulatory vote suppression, but the fact that state ID isn't very expensive, or could even be made free, isn't actually relevant -- "literacy tests" didn't cost voters anything but they were still a barrier.

To argue a broader point, we have voter check-in and check-out at polling places partly to confirm that people are registered (and to confirm that they're in the right precinct), and partly to compile turnout statistics. There is no epidemic of people who haven't registered trying to cast fraudulent votes, or of illegal immigrants trying to vote, or anything like that, and in cases where it's suspected that people have votes fraudulently, there are adequate procedures in place for challenging votes after the fact. In the absence of any such crisis which would demand it, a requirement to show ID essentially constitutes a "guilty until proven innocent" attitude toward voters.

[evan712.livejournal.com]

There is no epidemic of people who haven't registered trying to cast fraudulent votes, or of illegal immigrants trying to vote, or anything like that

How can you prove that if you don't have decent records to prove who votes?

[greyhame.livejournal.com]

Because there are adequate procedures in place for challenging votes after the fact. If there's a suspicion of that kind of fraud, challenges can be made. That not very many challenges are made of course isn't proof that that kind of fraud isn't happening, but it's strong evidence.

[evan712.livejournal.com]

The problem with that theory is that someone would have to be suspicious. Where are the suspicions going to start? With the overworked essentially volunteer poll workers or with the voters themselves? They are the only ones that have direct contact during the election. Or are we going to rely on analysts that tell us that too many people voted in a handful of precincts?

Things like this have happened before. The most obvious example was the 1960 presidential election. That one came to light because it was so obvious.

How many races could be affected by 3000 false votes done this way? The 2000 presidential election? The Montana Senate Race? The point is it is an obvious and easy way to commit vote fraud that can be made far more difficult with just a small effort. Fixing this issue lowers the margin of error on our elections.

re: [1]

[etherial.livejournal.com]

[1] is not so bad. "Prove to me that you voted for Y or you're fired" is.

[mr-teem.livejournal.com]

Certain types of identification requirements are effectively poll taxes.

Last year, Georgia was blocked in U.S. District Court from attempting to enforce it's voter identification program. Among other provisions, it would have required people that did not have a government issued identification (such as a driver's license or a passport) to spend $20 for a five-year special identity card, only available at Department of Motor Vehicles offices. (Georgians can use one of several other methods of identification when challenged at a polling station.) There were a limited number of DMV offices (not even one for every county and none in Atlanta) and the special identification cards required a birth certificate, which many poor and minority citizens don't have. (Hurm. I just realized that I don't know where mine is. That will probably require a few phone calls since the hospital where I was born is currently rubble.) At the time it was being argued, officials in charge of Georgia elections admitted that there hadn't been a proven case of voter fraud in over a decade.