I’m putting this in GD, not because I have a side in this discussion, but because I simply don’t see a valid argument against voter IDs and would like to hear some. If the IDs are free and reasonably easy to get, what is the problem?
They are talking about a cost of 30 bucks. To get them you would have to go to a specified office. Some counties have one office. It would be restrictive and control would be possible.
Alright…so I make X tens of thousands of dollars a year, and the government takes Y tens of thousands of dollars from that. Tens of thousands of dollars is fine, but $30 and a drive is too much? :dubious:
I’m doubting there’s no way to make sure that homeless people couldn’t get registered as well, even minus the $30.
And I would suspect that the goal is to be restrictive. You want to verify that the person is a legal citizen with voting rights, and you need to verify that he is a real person and not just some name off a gravestone. So saying that it’s bad because it’s restrictive is like saying having airport security is bad because it’s restrictive of who can get on the plane.
I think it is a knee jerk reaction. Voting restrictions in the past have tended to exclude minority voters, and I think that many people do not trust the people proposing this solution.
I’m a liberal. but I am all for some sort of national ID card. We already have driver’s licenses as a de facto ID, but they have many deficiencies: many people do not drive, they cost money, they do not indicate citizenship, etc. If we are going to require ID anyway for things like getting on airplanes, let’s at least have a good system in place.
I’d like to see a single card that can be used for voting, Soc Sec, employability status, driving privileges, age verification, etc. It should be free and readily available. At the same time there should be clear law as to when it is required so that it isn’t used in a way that violates peoples’ rights.
That it’s selectively restrictive is really the only objection that’s been made. I personally find the particulars of that argument unconvincing, but it’s clear there have been some implementation issues in GA. It continues to baffle me that I can make such perfect use of my bank account with a little plastic card, but our voting system is such a sloppy mess, made all the more messy by the mere logistics of plastic card distribution.
As American citizens we already have the right to vote. I don’t think we should have to pay an extra nickel for it. The question is would this voter ID discourage more legitimate voters that it would illegitimate. I’m thinking it would. Most of those would be the poor.
The governments job should be to facilitate voters exercising their right. Finding ways to make sure everyone that wants to vote has the opportunity rather than making it more difficult under the guise of preventing false voters.
We’ve already seen examples of efforts to discourage voters. It’s shameful and decidedly undemocratic. An insult to our founding fathers and our Constitution. We don’t need more of that crap.
I don’t think false voters is a huge problem compared to a concerted effort by some to discourage legitimate voters and there are better ways to deal with it.
Although I can’t speak to the prevalence of a “false voter” problem, the whole point is that the card demonstrates that you’re an American citizen. It’d be somewhat like saying that as a 19-year-old in Saskatchewan, I have the right to drink, so I shouldn’t be carded in bars.
Exactly. I have the right to vote as a citizen, but I don’t have the right to be taken at my word that I am one. That said, we have all kinds of ways to demonstrate citizenship, so the only benefit of an additional identifier is if it makes the practice of voting more regular, efficient, and reliable. Some claim it will, some claim it won’t. In practice, looks like in GA some folks were majorly inconvenienced by typical bureaucratic snafus, which is troubling. You don’t want civil rights trampled on by stupid red tape.
Essentially, it’s a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist. There just isn’t any evidence of huge degrees of THIS sort of voter fraud.
It’s no coincidence that Republicans are for it and Democrats oppose it. It basically targets the lazy and the poor, which, like it or not, tend to vote Democratic.
A real solution would simply be some sort of national voter registration program, or at least a state-wide one. It wouldn’t be particularly hard or even that expensive, since it could work off the existing system of official residency. It would make fraud next to impossible. Unfortunately, it would also make it too easy for people to vote, so, of course, Republicans generally oppose it.
Well, it wouldn’t be that. Our founding fathers didn’t like the idea of the poor voting.
Evidently you totally missed the point. I did say I shouldn’t have to **pay extra **to insure my right to vote didn’t I? I have no problem with efforts being made to insure that citizens vote and non citizens don’t. Avoiding voter fraud is a good idea if the process doesn’t discourage legitimate voters more than it prevents fraud. Get it!!
So… your analogy was wrong. It’s nothing like that.
Which founding fathers would that be? I’m not argueing. I’m sincerely curious. I’m sure some didn’t want the poor to vote just as some wanted us to be a “Christian” nation. Ultimately they decided to defend the right to vote for all citizens didn’t they?
Sure sounds like a poll tax to me. Wasn’t that outlawed?
Well, the original conception of the Electoral College leaves me with little doubt that the Founders regarded the matter of governance to be beyond the ken of the hoi polloi, and there needed to be a robust buffer between the voter and the State should their choice be a poor one.
As I recall, originally voting was restricted to free (as opposed to slave or indentured) males over 21 who owned a certain amount of land. Females, minorities, and the poor didn’t have the right to vote.
I guess what frustrates me about it is - how do I put this - I don’t see how anyone in today’s society can function without some sort of identification. Not necessarily a driver’s license, but some sort of ID. How do they cash a check? If they are on some sort of government assistance, isn’t ID required for that? (and if not, why not?) A state-issued ID doesn’t cost $30.
Here’s a link to an article about a judge throwing out the Missouri law. In this one, the card was free, but you have to present a birth certificate or passport to get it. These cost money. Here is a more general article, from People for the American Way, but it has lots of references. Particularly interesting is
Georgia was supposed to get free ids to those without drivers licenses, but so far they seem not to have gotten around to it. I wonder why?
The first thing is that there is no problem. Voting fraud is not an issue. The second thing is that this is part of a series of actions by Republican state governments to make it harder for minorities to vote. You surely remember the Florida felon lists?
Now, if you trust Republicans to never, ever, do anything to keep potential democratic voters from the polls - you should go back to the cabbage patch.
And how much does a Saskatchewan driver’s licence (the only common ID accepted by the bars) cost? $25.00 CAN. So if **Speaker ** wants to go to a bar, which he has the legal right to do without paying any money (on the way in, at least… 
) he has to have shelled out money for the ID. Seems a pretty straightforward analogy to me.
The New York Times editorial does a pretty good job of explaining the reasoning against having a national voter ID.
Many poor people don’t drive and have no license and certainly no need of a passport. Getting an official non-drivers ID card from the state would take more effort than many would be willing to take. So the net effect of an ID would be to disproportionately disenfranchise people based on their economic class. The solution seems worse than the problem, again quoting the Times editorial:
That’s right. Some states also had racial restrictions.