So Voter ID is bad because someone is too embarrassed to get ID? This example does not help out your side at all.
No, they are too embarrassed to trumpet in the newspapers for public consumption what they regard as a shameful family secret. Bricker wants citations to real people; that means newspaper articles or other public sources. It has nothing to do with “too embarrassed to get ID”; it’s “too embarrassed to tell the media about why they lack certain documents or have trouble getting ID.”
Here, let’s take the most embarrassing, shameful, degrading secret in your family. Publish it in the newspaper with your real name, and the real names of all relatives involved. Make sure your neighbors and co-workers, and the other kids in school with yours, gets to know the gory details. Provide us a link.
Then name the person who can’t vote in his state. It doesn’t have to be Kansas. But don’t show me John Doe of Tennessee who can’t vote under Kansas’ rules; he doesn’t need to. But I’ll certainly accept a case of John Doe of Tennessee who cannot vote under Tennessee’s rules (without expending thousands of dollars, a parenthetical reminder I add because it’s necessary in discussions with you, evidently).
It didn’t cost anything. Her daughter had the Bible. Cite.
Not one dollar. Just a daughter, with family records.
From KCUR news radio. Cite.
This continues to be the pattern. Grand claims are made about the people affected, and examination of the claims makes each melt away.
Find me a single, verified, actual person in the United States of America, just one, who cannot vote except upon the expenditure of thousands of dollars. It can be any state you like for residency, and any state you like for birth. Just be specific.
Who?
I’m not saying you’re wrong, only showing that it isn’t as difficult or as expensive as slash2k is making it out to be.
Your own citation says “The bible had recently sold at an estate sale. Thankfully the buyer contacted Hopkins and thought the family should have the Bible back.” It was gone, out of the family, and they were able to retrieve it. Did the family have to buy it back? Your citation doesn’t say. Did the census records just magically appear, or did somebody pay a researcher to retrieve them? Your citation doesn’t say. Did Howard or her mother consult an attorney when preparing for the hearing? Your citation doesn’t say.
Where is your evidence that this didn’t cost anything, “not one dollar”?
Conceded. Local media coverage didn’t include that detail.
No, I’m talking about the people who WOULD BE affected by voter ID laws such as that passed in Kansas. I made my statement about thousands of dollars in response to doorhinge’s comment in #26 that “No legal voter would be disenfranchised” and his call for the expansion of voter ID laws to additional states.
I’ve shown you ample evidence that there are people living in this country who do not have any of the documents that would be required under more restrictive voter ID laws.
You’re asking me to assume that the laws are static, that no additional state will pass such laws, which isn’t the context in which I spoke. You are also asking me to speculate on exactly how much a legal process that hasn’t happened yet is going to cost. (I understand you are an attorney–can you say with absolute certainty the cost of a given legal proceeding before that proceeding begins? I’m not an attorney, and I sure can’t.)
Look at Wilola Lee of Pennsylvania. At the time of that article, she’d already spent “hundreds of dollars” trying to get a Georgia birth certificate, and had been told
she needed to go see a judge in Georgia. (Cost not given–would you care to argue that a court hearing 800 miles from home would not or could not cost thousands in legal fees, travel expenses, etc.?) (Gloria Torres and Lenora Carey, also in Pennsylvania, were taken on by pro bono attorneys–had the Pennsylvania law been enforced, somebody was going to be shelling out some money, even if it was “only” the law firm. Gloria Cuttino needed a delayed birth certificate from South Carolina–the ACLU of South Carolina has estimated that that process takes about eight hours of legal work, plus a $150 filing fee. What’s the going rate for eight hours of legal work by an attorney of any skill whatsoever?
Each of these women would have been prevented from voting by the laws on the books. Each was actually able to vote because the courts overturned Pennsylvania’s voter ID law and Gov. Corbett gave up appealing. I’m going to count the cost of the legal work by the ACLU and various pro bono law firms as expenditures to allow them to vote, and I’m further going to estimate that expenditure in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Do you disagree with that
estimate?
What is the cost of obtaining a delayed birth certificate via judicial process in your state?
I withdraw the claim that it didn’t cost a dollar.
Now, before I go hunting down the details – is THIS is the case you’re contending proves your claim about “thousands of dollars?”
In other words, it costs you very little time to continue throwing names up and it costs me more time to research the details that disprove them. So is this the case that you’re saying proves your claim?
But you haven’t shown me that any of those people live in any of those states.
No. I’m showing that your claim is merely speculative – you’re saying that some future set of circumstances MIGHT cost thousands of dollars, and therefore we should repeal extant Voter ID laws, even though none of them actually create the consequence you are describing.
Yes. You may as well count the cost against the state to distribute free IDs as a “cost.” The cost is whatever is born by the voter.
Unless your new argument is, “These Voter ID laws are terrible; they cost the ACLU thousands of dollars!”
Or if your argument is, “The Pennsylvania law is flawed and should be changed,” then I agree. But the PA law’s flaws cannot be imputed to other laws in other states.
Not required in RI to get a voter ID, so zero. See post #98 to see all the possible documentation that will get you a voter ID card in RI.
If in some other reason someone needs a delayed birth certificate, I do not know the cost - but to get a voter ID, it is not required in RI.
Bricked, you know you can’t accuse others of lying in Great Debates.
Warning and please don’t do it again.
This is more bureaucracy than law. If her birth certificate does not exist, she can get one under O.C.G.A. § 31-10-11. Why her copy is uncertified, I don’t know but by law it should have been. Total cost $35.
Assuming she can prove she was born Gloria Pabon, file for a legal name change to Gloria Torres.
Since there are no details to be hunted down in public (the whole story rests on a couple of newspaper articles and whatever archival records are in the possession of the State Election Board), this case cannot be used to prove or disprove any claim about money.
However, this case DOES prove that there are genuine American citizens who lack the “normal” forms of identification such as birth certificates, documents that voter ID laws assume are in the possession or within the grasp of every eligible voter. I use this case, and cases such as Alecia Pennington and Wilola Lee, to prove that there are a number of people out there who don’t have 'em.
Proofs about how much any individual case will cost are few and far between. For example, the articles about Howard note that she was “at least” the third case considered; who were the others, and how much did they spend? The articles about various Kansas nursing homes don’t identify even the names of all the residents who lacked ID, much less how much was expended on their behalf to secure their right to vote.
However, if there are ANY people who lack ID (and I have proven there are), there will be some who are required to use elaborate procedures to obtain it. The South Carolina ACLU, e.g., says that filing for a delayed birth certificate takes about eight hours of legal work. In my part of the world, that’s going to be billed somewhere in the range of $1800-2400 for an associate in civil practice, maybe a little less for a lawyer fresh out of school and a little more for a partner. In some parts of the U.S., it might be somewhat cheaper; in your part of the U.S., it’s likely to be rather higher. That’s an amount somebody is spending on the client’s behalf, even if it is treated as pro bono or paid by a community organization.
Why would I need to show that? The argument was about whether such laws when extended to new states would burden people in those new states. Anybody in any state who would have to spend thousands to prove their citizenship would be an example of that burden.
I’m saying that some future set of circumstances WILL cost thousands of dollars, and there is reason to believe that existing sets of circumstances have already or will in future costs thousands. The notion that a family Bible never owned by the claimant will miraculously appear for every claimant is what is speculative.
I am counting as a cost that which is borne by the voter or those acting on the voter’s behalf. If the voter’s lawyer has to spend thousands of dollars, the fact that the lawyer discounts or waives the fee doesn’t mean the expenditure didn’t take place.
The argument to which I was responding was that laws like that in Pennsylvania and Kansas and Wisconsin should be extended to other states. If you agree these laws are flawed, then you are agreeing with the essence of my argument.
Specifically, I was addressing a hypothetical Illinois law–you wish me to assume that such a law would not have any of the flaws of existing laws in the various states? Is that not speculative?
But the articles state that the Georgia Office of Vital Statistics refuses to certify it and told her she needs to go see a judge. Even if they should by law, filing for a writ of mandamus to compel them to do so is not free.
If she could prove she was born Gloria Pabon, she wouldn’t need to change her name legally.
Moreover, you correctly point out that a legal name change in Pennsylvania requires only a few documents, including a birth certificate. Have you researched what it takes to order a birth certificate from the Puerto Rico Dept of Health or uscerts.com? (Hint: it takes an identification document, such as a scanned copy of a current driver’s license or passport. Now what is Gloria Torres lacking? Oh yes, current identification.)
And of course the reporter asked Georgia why they refused to certify so we could get the full story. Oh wait, no they didn’t.
The article never stated she couldn’t prove her birthname (I may have missed it however). It seemed that because the change of her name was not recorded, the issue is that there is no link between her name now and her birthname.
Because you oppose all Voter ID laws, not just Pennsylvania’s flawed attempt. You cannot claim that anyone in any state is subject to a law that was dropped by one state.
The UK Electoral Commission published a report (pdf) on Electoral fraud in the UK.
Some selected quotes:
That second quote seems to be particularly relevant to the US.
Just this year there was the case of Lutfur Rahman.