Since after they won the election of 1896, the Republicans have worked diligently to make sure that fewer and fewer people vote and that those who do vote are elites rather than the poor or marginalized. What we are seeing today is a continuation of that strategy started over a 115 years ago to make sure that races are won and the opposition voters are few. This strategy is designed to giver Republicans the winning margin even if they wind up only representing about 13 percent of the population. In these cases you can rest assured that they scream the loudest about a mandate and about other things such as how their victory shows that the people of the United States are completely behind their ridiculous program of more for the 1% and less for the rest. But now they may have to refine their argument for why it makes sense to disenfranchise voters!
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
Voter Suppression’s New Pretext
By RICHARD L. HASEN
Published: November 15, 2013
IRVINE, Calif. — IT’S the latest fad among state officials looking to make voting harder: We’re not racist, we’re just partisan.
Some background: In June, the Supreme Court struck down a core provision of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, under which nine states and portions of others had to get federal approval before changing their election laws.
One of those states, Texas, is again in court, facing a Justice Department suit seeking to get the state under federal oversight again. To do so, the Justice Department must prove intentional racial discrimination.
Texas’ defense? It’s discrimination, all right — but it’s on the basis of party, not race, and therefore it’s O.K.
Says Texas: “It is perfectly constitutional for a Republican-controlled legislature to make partisan districting decisions, even if there are incidental effects on minority voters who support Democratic candidates.”
Leaving aside that whopper — laws that dilute black and Hispanic voting power have more than an “incidental” impact — the statement, part of a court filing in August, was pretty brazen. Minority voters, in Texas and elsewhere, tend to support Democrats. So Republican officials, especially but not only in the South, want to reduce early voting; impose voter-identification requirements; restrict voter registration; and, critically, draw districts either to crowd as many minority voters into as few districts as possible, or dilute concentrations of minority voters by dispersing them into as many white-controlled districts as possible.
The Supreme Court decision unleashed all manner of new efforts to suppress minority voting — and a new batch of legal challenges.
Just this week, a federal judge in Milwaukee considered whether Wisconsin’s tough new voter-ID law violates the 1965 law by placing illegal burdens on minority voters. As in the Texas suit, the Justice Department has sued North Carolina, which in August passed the toughest set of voting rules since the passage of the Voting Rights Act, arguing that the law was passed with racist intent. If successful, Texas and North Carolina could be put back under federal supervision.
Unlike with race-based discrimination, which, if proved, could violate both the Voting Rights Act and the Constitution, the Supreme Court has refused to recognize a standard for policing even nakedly partisan gerrymandering.
But now, supporters of strict voter-ID, registration and other voting laws are trying to use the same defense they have used to defend gerrymandering. They can claim ostensibly good reasons for their laws: preventing fraud or saving money. As a fallback, they can claim, like Texas, they are engaged in permissible partisan discrimination, not impermissible race discrimination.
But this is specious. First, it is artificial to separate race and party under current political conditions. When Don Yelton, a Republican official in North Carolina, recently told “The Daily Show” that if the state’s strict new voter-ID law “hurts a bunch of lazy blacks,” then “so be it,” it was easy to see old-fashioned Southern racism. But just as significant was Mr. Yelton’s saying that the new law “is going to kick the Democrats in the butt.”
Second, courts should alleviate unnecessary burdens on voters whatever the state’s asserted motive. The Supreme Court has said that, in redistricting, it cannot distinguish between permissible partisan considerations (for example, grouping “communities of interest”) and unconstitutional gerrymandering. But outside redistricting, partisanship has no place. Our elections should be conducted such that all eligible voters (and only eligible voters) can easily register, and cast a vote that will be accurately counted.
Few states will be as bold as Texas and admit naked partisanship. Most will engage in polite obfuscation.
Federal judges should see through these cynical pretexts. They should hold that when a state passes a law that burdens voters, it must demonstrate, with credible evidence, that the burdens are justified by a good reason and that the laws are tailored to their intended purpose. When North Carolina says it needs a strict voter-ID law to prevent fraud, courts should be skeptical, both because such laws haven’t been found to stop much impersonation fraud (there isn’t a lot) and because the same law eased absentee voting, which increases the risk of fraud.
Read more at: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/16/opinion/voter-suppressions-new-pretext.html?src=rechp&_r=0
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
Voter Suppression’s New Pretext
By RICHARD L. HASEN
Published: November 15, 2013
IRVINE, Calif. — IT’S the latest fad among state officials looking to make voting harder: We’re not racist, we’re just partisan.
Some background: In June, the Supreme Court struck down a core provision of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, under which nine states and portions of others had to get federal approval before changing their election laws.
One of those states, Texas, is again in court, facing a Justice Department suit seeking to get the state under federal oversight again. To do so, the Justice Department must prove intentional racial discrimination.
Texas’ defense? It’s discrimination, all right — but it’s on the basis of party, not race, and therefore it’s O.K.
Says Texas: “It is perfectly constitutional for a Republican-controlled legislature to make partisan districting decisions, even if there are incidental effects on minority voters who support Democratic candidates.”
Leaving aside that whopper — laws that dilute black and Hispanic voting power have more than an “incidental” impact — the statement, part of a court filing in August, was pretty brazen. Minority voters, in Texas and elsewhere, tend to support Democrats. So Republican officials, especially but not only in the South, want to reduce early voting; impose voter-identification requirements; restrict voter registration; and, critically, draw districts either to crowd as many minority voters into as few districts as possible, or dilute concentrations of minority voters by dispersing them into as many white-controlled districts as possible.
The Supreme Court decision unleashed all manner of new efforts to suppress minority voting — and a new batch of legal challenges.
Just this week, a federal judge in Milwaukee considered whether Wisconsin’s tough new voter-ID law violates the 1965 law by placing illegal burdens on minority voters. As in the Texas suit, the Justice Department has sued North Carolina, which in August passed the toughest set of voting rules since the passage of the Voting Rights Act, arguing that the law was passed with racist intent. If successful, Texas and North Carolina could be put back under federal supervision.
Unlike with race-based discrimination, which, if proved, could violate both the Voting Rights Act and the Constitution, the Supreme Court has refused to recognize a standard for policing even nakedly partisan gerrymandering.
But now, supporters of strict voter-ID, registration and other voting laws are trying to use the same defense they have used to defend gerrymandering. They can claim ostensibly good reasons for their laws: preventing fraud or saving money. As a fallback, they can claim, like Texas, they are engaged in permissible partisan discrimination, not impermissible race discrimination.
But this is specious. First, it is artificial to separate race and party under current political conditions. When Don Yelton, a Republican official in North Carolina, recently told “The Daily Show” that if the state’s strict new voter-ID law “hurts a bunch of lazy blacks,” then “so be it,” it was easy to see old-fashioned Southern racism. But just as significant was Mr. Yelton’s saying that the new law “is going to kick the Democrats in the butt.”
Second, courts should alleviate unnecessary burdens on voters whatever the state’s asserted motive. The Supreme Court has said that, in redistricting, it cannot distinguish between permissible partisan considerations (for example, grouping “communities of interest”) and unconstitutional gerrymandering. But outside redistricting, partisanship has no place. Our elections should be conducted such that all eligible voters (and only eligible voters) can easily register, and cast a vote that will be accurately counted.
Few states will be as bold as Texas and admit naked partisanship. Most will engage in polite obfuscation.
Federal judges should see through these cynical pretexts. They should hold that when a state passes a law that burdens voters, it must demonstrate, with credible evidence, that the burdens are justified by a good reason and that the laws are tailored to their intended purpose. When North Carolina says it needs a strict voter-ID law to prevent fraud, courts should be skeptical, both because such laws haven’t been found to stop much impersonation fraud (there isn’t a lot) and because the same law eased absentee voting, which increases the risk of fraud.
Read more at: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/16/opinion/voter-suppressions-new-pretext.html?src=rechp&_r=0
