Taking away the right to vote

While Wisconsin Republicans gleefully point out that Jimmy Carter agreed to support a recommendation for photo IDs for voters -- one of 87 recommendations, Sadie points out -- the New York Times explains what's wrong with that proposal.

It is simply this: It makes it more difficult for people to vote, especially the poor, minorities, and elderly.

Whether the ID is free or not is irrelevant, although the $20 fee in Georgia seems awfully close to a poll tax. What will be required to obtain that free ID? A birth certificate? Social Security card? Mail to your current address? All of the above? Will you need a new ID every time you move? Will it be easier to get an ID card than it is to get a driver's license? (Ever stand in line at the Milwaukee DOT office on 6th Street?)

The whole point is that the photo ID requirement will guarantee that many people who otherwise would exercise their right -- let me say that again, their right -- to vote would not do so. And that, of course, is the whole idea -- to discourage the poor and minorities in urban areas (the Democratic base, in other words) from exercising that right.

Jimmy Carter was taken to the cleaners on this one. That's no reason we should follow him.

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NY Times Editorial

Denying Access to the Ballot

It has been clear since 2000 that the election system is in serious need of reform. But the commission led by James Baker III and former President Jimmy Carter has come up with a plan that is worse than no reform at all. Its good ideas are outweighed by one very bad idea: a voter identification requirement that would prevent large numbers of poor, black and elderly people from voting.

The commission makes helpful recommendations. It favors requiring electronic voting machines to produce paper records, and opposes partisan activity by state election officials. It fails to address other problems, like not counting provisional ballots cast at the wrong
precincts.

But the bombshell recommendation is for the states to require voters to have drivers' licenses or a government-issued photo ID. That would not be a great burden for people who have drivers' licenses, but it would be for those who don't, and they are disproportionately poor, elderly or members of minorities. These voters would have to get special photo ID's and keep them updated. If they didn't have the ID's, their right to vote would be taken away.

The commission recommends that the cards be free. But election administration is notoriously underfinanced, and it is not hard to imagine that states would charge for them. Georgia is already charging $20 and more for each of its state voter cards.

There is very little evidence of voters' claiming to be people they are not, and the commission admits that its members are divided about how big a problem it is. But the report goes on to say that even if there is just a small amount of fraud, it should be stopped. True, but if the solution risks disenfranchising hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of voters, it is a very bad reform.

There are more reasonable approaches. The states could require uniform ID's, but allow each voter without one to sign an affidavit attesting to his or her identity, a system some states use now. It is little wonder that a dissent came from the former Democratic leader in the Senate, Tom Daschle, a commission member. He said that "for some, the commission's ID proposal constitutes nothing short of a modern-day poll tax."

The disappointing report made public yesterday was not a complete surprise. There have been red flags waving around the commission for some time;Mr. Baker is remembered by many for his fierce fight to stop the counting of votes in Florida in 2000. There have also been complaints about the commission's process. Spencer Overton, a George Washington University law professor and commission member, complains that he was told he had to limit a dissent on complicated voting issues to just 250 words.

The purpose of election reform should not be making it harder to vote. We all have a duty to make our election system as good as it can be - and not to disenfranchise people in the name of reform.