Our tax dollars at work:
If the U.S. Supreme Court upholds Indiana’s harsh voter ID law, as it seems poised to do, hundreds of thousands of black Americans should march in protest. So should hundreds of thousands of Latino Americans. Native Americans, too. Political activists from across the ethnic spectrum should convene the biggest political demonstration since the historic March on Washington in 1963.
~~~ The GOP-led campaign to pass stringent voter ID laws is a greater injustice than the prosecutions of the Jena Six, more significant than the incarceration of Michael Vick, more damaging than the insulting rants of Don Imus. This is a brazen effort to block the votes of thousands of people of color who might have the temerity to vote for Democrats. And it’s un-American.
~~~ But there is evidence aplenty of this: There are thousands of law-abiding registered voters across the land who have no government-sponsored ID — no passport, no driver’s license — and who will be banned from the ballot box if the highest court upholds this highly partisan law.
~~~ Citizens like Criswell are Americans, too, and they have every right to vote, just like it says in the Bill of Rights.
The above idiocy comes from a editor at a major newspaper in our country. Unbelievable.
The fact is there is NO Constitutional right to vote in a federal election. It’s really not that hard to do research in this day and age so lets say your educated in a public school and just do not know if it’s a Constitutional right. What should you do?
Why, look it up.
But not this lady. She assumes there is a right. Just like she obviously assumed the Jena scumbags were lynched, that a dog fighting criminal is not really a criminal, and that if you don’t have a I.D. you will not be able to vote.
The fact of the matter is this law in question makes provisions for people who are too poor to pay for a photo ID, and even allows people to file a religious objection to it. But say you still don’t have an ID. It then gives that person a chance to file a provisional vote.
So in reality it doesn’t deny anyone the right to vote.
We know the real reason this editor, and other Democrats, are upset over this law tho. They know they will lose votes if Democrats are forced to prove they are who they say they are.
But U.S. District Judge Sarah Evans Barker, who first upheld Indiana’s photo ID law in 2006, cited a state study that found 99% of the voting-age population had the necessary photo ID. Judge Barker also noted that Indiana provided a photo ID for free to anyone who could prove their identity, and that critics of the law “have produced not a single piece of evidence of any identifiable registered voter who would be prevented from voting.”
Since then, liberal groups have pointed to last November’s mayoral election in Indianapolis as giving real-life examples of people prevented from voting. The 34 voters out of 165,000 who didn’t have the proper ID were allowed to cast a provisional ballot, and could have had their votes counted by going to a clerk’s office within 10 days to show ID or sign an affidavit attesting to their identity. Two chose to do so, but 32 did not.
Indeed, a new study by Jeffrey Milyo of the Truman Institute of Public Policy on Indiana’s voter turnout in 2006 did not find evidence that counties with more poor, elderly or minority voters had “any reduction in voter turnout relative to other counties.”
This article of Cynthia Tucker’s is just one more example of the lack of credibility the MSM has in todays world.
See author page
An additional point that might be mssed is that the reason so many of the provisional voters may have opted not to go and confirm their identity would be because their vot proved not to be decisive to the out come. In the even that the elction hung on the 34 provisional vote, I feel pretty confident that those voters would have been found and their identity established so that their votes counted. Better that than what we had here in Washington state where teh governership was determined by ~16 votes and then it was found that there were potentially thousands of illegal votes.
I’m sure MLK is PROUD, just PROUD of “his” community. His legacy is being pissed on by these racists clowns.
Lets see you, poor or rich, cash a check without picture I.D. No one in this country is to poor that they would go penniless because of I.D.
Re: “The fact is there is NO Constitutional right to vote in a federal election. It’s really not that hard to do research in this day and age so lets say your educated in a public school and just do not know if it’s a Constitutional right. What should you do? ”
Amendment XV
Section. 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
Amendment XIX
[Proposed 1919; Ratified 1920]
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
Amendment XXIV
Section. 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.
Amendment XXVI
Section. 1. The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.
Amendment XIV
Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
(The courts have generally held that the right to vote is among those “privileges”.)
As a Conservative, I knwo that you know what is best for the rest of us. Who, exactly, do you deem worthy of voting in US elections?
“Amendment XV
Section. 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”
These laws aren’t denying anyone the right to vote. And the requirement of ID is not based on race, color, or being a former slave.
“Amendment XIX
[Proposed 1919; Ratified 1920]
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”
The requirement to show ID does not deny someone the right to vote based on their sex.
“Amendment XXIV
Section. 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.”
Indiana offers to provide free state ID’s. So there is no cost to the voter if they need one. It doesn’t qualify as a poll tax. And not having and ID they are still able to vote by casting a provisional ballot.
“Amendment XXVI
Section. 1. The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age”
The law is not denying anyone the right to vote based on their age.
“Amendment XIV
Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
The privilege to vote is not being denied. A person though should be able to prove that they are living in that state before they can cast a vote.
“As a Conservative, I knwo that you know what is best for the rest of us. Who, exactly, do you deem worthy of voting in US elections?”
American citizens over the age of 18. One vote per person. Why are you so against attempts to prevent voter fraud and ensure that this is the way it is? Is it because you’ll be worried that precincts in the Philadelphia area will no longer be able to maintain their 100+% voter turnout?
The Bush Administration Justice Department, full of “Loyal Bushies” have come up with fewer than 150 prosecutions nationwide in the past seven years over voter fraud. And some of them were blatantly political in nature.
Other than from FoxNews pundits, where is the problem you are trying to solve?
I never said that someone should not have to provide ID to register to vote. I was only disputing your assertion that the right to vote in federal elections was not guaranteed anywhere: I provided sources that indicated otherwise.
Man Stevo….must be sad to be wrong so often.
Check out Michael Dorf’s, Vice Dean and Professor of Law at Columbia Universty, article in which he calls for Constitutional amendment to ensure there IS a right to vote in a federal election. He calls for it because the Supreme Court has ruled the Constitution does NOT say that.
You can even read the Supreme Courts ruling here.
Hell, why not look at a HJR28, a purposed amendment to the Constitution, giving citizens the right to vote. If it existed before, why put a amendment bill up?
While you at it, look up Alexander v Mineta where the court said the Constitution:
Which means the STATES get to decide who is qualified to vote.
I will give you this, you are alway consistent. Consistently wrong, but consistent nonetheless.
Then I stand corrected. I assumed those amendments were sufficient. I would then support such an amendment.