‘Voter ID requirements’ Category

Wednesday, December 16th, 2009

If Everyone Else Is Doing It…

Voter ID is a controversial topic that we’ve taken on here before. We even shot a vlog (watch the video) to see how long it would take to get a voter ID if you lived in California without a drivers license or car, and it wasn’t easy.

In a new paper for the Harvard Law and Policy Review, Why Tuesday? advisory board member Tova Wang and Frederic Schaffer say that the “everyone else is doing it” argument about voter ID is not quite true.

One of the claims made by advocates of Indiana-like voter identification laws is that other countries require identification to vote, so therefore the United States should too. “If ID cards threaten democracy, why does almost every democracy except us require them, and why are their elections conducted better than ours?” one prominent supporter has asked rhetorically. Senator Mitch McConnell, one of the major champions in Congress of strict voter identification laws, has used the same argument in pushing for such legislation. In the Supreme Court oral argument regarding Indiana’s law, Justice Alito queried, “If [impersonation fraud] is not a problem at all, how do you account for the fact that . . . many other countries around the world have voter ID requirements?”

The “everyone else is doing it” claim is exaggerated. While many countries require identification for voting, some do not. Countries that do not require identification include Denmark, Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom (with the exception of Northern Ireland). In Norway, Ireland, and the Netherlands, voters are required to present identification only if it is requested by a poll worker. In Switzerland, every registered voter is sent a registration card prior to an election, and if the voter brings her registration card to the polling place, no additional identification is needed.

To read their complete research paper in PDF form, download it here. Hat tip to Rick Hasen for bringing my attention to this article.

Related:
Latinos pledge opposition to proposed CA voter ID law

Posted in Voter ID requirements | No Comments »

Monday, May 12th, 2008

Here We Go Again…

The New York Times is reporting this morning that the debate over voter ID is moving to Missouri, where lawmakers there may vote to enact proof-of-citizenship requirements at the polls.

NYT Header
NYT Article

All this just weeks after the Supreme Court ruled that an Indiana law requiring photo ID at the polls is constitutional. Watch our report for a recap.

Posted in Missouri, Supreme Court, Voter ID requirements | Comments Off

Wednesday, May 7th, 2008

There’s Value in Voter ID — If It’s Done Properly

Norman J. Ornstein
Why Tuesday? Board Member Norman J. Ornstein

One of the most interesting and significant recent Supreme Court decisions concerned the Indiana voter identification law, in which the court by a 6-3 vote upheld the law despite zero evidence of in-person voting fraud in the state. In a major surprise, Justice John Paul Stevens led the opinion, saying the state’s interest in preventing such fraud justifies the Legislature’s action. Stevens did leave the door open to challenges to other states’ laws if they create too much of a burden on many voters.

Indiana’s law was better by far than the awful Georgia law that was overturned by the courts; in Indiana, the state would provide voters with the appropriate government-issue photo ID for free, while Georgia charged a significant fee, the equivalent of a poll tax. But Indiana’s requirements are plenty burdensome.

Elections need to be fair, and fraud is a real concern, especially in an era where the stakes are very high and the parties are close enough that many elections will be decided by razor-thin margins.

If a person cannot present a passport, driver’s license or other similar form of official identification, he or she must supply an official document, such as a birth certificate, to get the free ID, and getting a copy of a birth certificate is quite costly. The fact is that many elderly people and many poor people don’t drive, don’t fly and don’t have copies of their birth certificates. (more…)

Posted in Election Reform, Indiana, Voter ID requirements | Comments Off

Saturday, May 3rd, 2008

Tova Andrea Wang on Voter ID Laws

Why Tuesday? Advisory Board member and Vice President for Research at Common Cause Tova Andrea Wang spoke about state voter identification laws at a January 3 press briefing regarding Supreme Court cases Crawford v. Marion County Election Board and Indiana Democratic Party v. Rokita. The American Constitution Society hosted the event.

If you haven’t already, check out our talk with Loyola Law School William H. Hannon Distinguished Professor of Law Rick Hasen about voter ID (we also take the bus to see how long it would take to get one).

Video via acslaw1776 on YouTube.

Posted in Election Reform, Voter ID requirements, WT? Advisory Board | Comments Off

Friday, May 2nd, 2008

Why Voter ID?


We decided to explore Monday’s Supreme Court ruling which determined that requiring voters to show ID to cast a ballot is constitutional. I visited with election law expert Rick Hasen and hopped on the bus to time how long it would take to get a photo ID to vote if you don’t already have one.

Posted in Election Reform, Episodes, Featured, Supreme Court, Voter ID requirements | 4 Comments »

Monday, April 28th, 2008

Court’s Voter ID Decision Talk of L.A. Public Radio

Traffic

It’s always drive-time radio in Los Angeles. I just spent the afternoon maneuvering around this sweltering city, and today’s Supreme Court decision to uphold Indiana’s voter identification law was part of a feature segment at least twice this afternoon on NPR member station 89.3 KPCC here.

Rick Hasen of Loyola Marymount University and electionlawblog.org (who filed a friend-of-the-court brief on this case) broke down the specifics of the decision on AirTalk with Larry Mantle (listen here with Real Player). Today Hasen wrote for the Huffington Post that he believes this case “will encourage further litigation, because it relegates challenges to laws imposing onerous burdens on a small group of voters to “as applied” challenges, but those challenges will be difficult to win.”

Patt Morrison also took up the issue on her program (listen here with Real Player). For the full text of the Supreme Court’s decision via the New York Times, click here.

Los Angeles traffic photo via fredcamino on Flickr.

Posted in Supreme Court, Voter ID requirements | Comments Off

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

Meet The Election Assistance Commission *

EAC

The U.S. Election Assistance Commission is an independent, bipartisan commission created by the Help America Vote Act of 2002. It will be holding a public meeting in Minnesota on the 16th. The EAC is operates the federal government’s first voting system certification program and is charged with making sure HAVA is executed-as-planned. They also adopt voluntary voting system guidelines that are, well, voluntary, and, according to their website, provide “best practices and resources to election officials throughout the nation.” (more…)

Posted in Election Reform, HAVA, Minnesota, Voter ID requirements | Comments Off

Thursday, January 10th, 2008

NYT: Ain’t Looking Good for Voter ID Opponents

NYT

Linda Greenhouse, from the Supreme Court, reports for the New York Times that the justices’ actions yesterday indicate they might uphold Indiana’s voter ID law, and further, make it more difficult for similar cases to be brought in the future. She writes:

The justices’ questioning indicated that a majority did not accept the challengers’ basic argument — that voter-impersonation fraud is not a problem, so requiring voters to produce government-issued photo identification at the polls is an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote.

Stay tuned here for updates. For the complete article and an in-depth analysis, click here.

Previously:
Our Voter ID requirement archive

Posted in Election Reform, Indiana, Voter ID requirements | 2 Comments »

Tuesday, January 8th, 2008

NYT: “The most important case involving the mechanics of election administration in decades” heads to Supreme Court

NYT

WASHINGTON, DC — We hopped off the campaign trail for a night and headed down to DC, but have no fear, we’re on our way back to New Hampshire to cover today’s primary and the voter turnout there. If you haven’t seen it already, click here (video) for our look back at record turnout in Iowa (which didn’t break 17% of eligible voters), and our look ahead at what might happen in New Hampshire today.

Yesterday in the New York Times, reporter Ian Urbina detailed the back story to the Indiana voter ID case that is headed to the Supreme Court January 9th. We’ve been following it here for quite some time. At the heart of the matter is whether or not Indiana’s restrictive voter ID laws will stand. But the case has significance far beyond Indiana. Urbina writes:

How the court applies that test in this case could set the standard for challenges to election rules across the country. The decision could affect a range of other voting-related rules being imposed by states, including ones involving the handling of provisional ballots, new restrictions on voter registration and the methods states can use to purge voters from registration rolls.

For the full article, click here.

Posted in Election Reform, Election administration, Voter ID requirements | Comments Off

Monday, December 31st, 2007

AP: Voter ID Law Heads to Supreme Court

AP

We’ve been following the battles over voter ID requirements here for some time. According to the Associated Press, looks like Indiana’s voter ID law will head to the supreme court on January 9th. Mark Sherman gives the background:

On one side are mainly Republican backers of the law, including the Bush administration, who say state-produced photo identification is a prudent measure intended to cut down on vote fraud. Yet there have been no Indiana prosecutions of in-person voter fraud — the kind the law is supposed to prevent.

On the other side are mainly Democratic opponents who call voter ID a modern-day poll tax that will disproportionately affect poor, minority and elderly voters — who tend to back Democrats. Yet, a federal judge found that opponents of the law were unable to produce evidence of a single, individual Indiana resident who had been barred from voting because of the law.

For the complete details from the AP, click here. (more…)

Posted in Election Reform, Voter ID requirements | Comments Off

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