you mean a large industrial city had people getting licenses on their lunch breaks when they actually had time off? Amazifying!
absentee ballot
Unless you have a 12 hour work day, that’s a non-started since polls are open 6am-7pm
Perhaps you missed the part about it being every citizen’s right to vote? Voting is not synonymous with the ability to drive. And why would you ever get a license if you lived in a city with extensive public transportation? Besides, if you bothered to read my posts, you’d see that since they started requiring birth certs to get drivers licenses, you’d realize that its a pretty big issue to even get a drivers license in the first place. Millions of people simply don’t have their birth certificates.
When did anyone say it had to be a drivers license? A state photo ID should be simple enough. Whatever the citeria for that state to issue an ID would be all that’s needed. You have FOUR years to figure it out, if you’re serious about voting, that is.
How are all these people that can’t verify their existense getting jobs, assistance, bank accounts, etc??? Do you really expect us to let anyone vote especially if they can’t prove they’re a citizen of this country? There must be some security, some form of verification, No?
You mention that it’s everyone’s right to vote…doesn’t there need to be some responsibility on the shoulders of the voters to make sure that it’s an honest and accurate vote? That responsibility is making sure that all votes are legitimate and that means getting pre-registered with an ID.
I don’t understand why you find this assertion relevant ( even ignoring the fact that elections occur more frequently than once every four years ). Why should it be important when a person makes the decision to vote? If they are a citizen and want to vote then I believe that should be enough. Why should anyone’s opinion of whether this makes a person’s desire to vote serious or not even enter into it?
I have no problem requiring identification. On the contrary, properly determining eligibility is a necessity for fair elections. But this shoud not prevent registration from occuring at the polls themselves. Those who cannot produce proper identification upon request should be given provisional ballots to be sealed and counted if their eligibility is later established.
Just my 2sense
And we’re still ignoring the fact that many many people cannot even obtain this ID to begin with because of the absence of birth certificates.
With their old state IDs, soc sec cards etc. The problem comes when someone goes to renew their license. They recently changed the requirements for obtaining one to include the birth certificate.
After going through this thread, it seems as though the principle objections to the voter ID card are 1) the cost to purchase one, and 2) the difficulty in getting one for people who do not have a birth certificate. Couldn’t we solve these problems by 1) waiving the fee for people who can’t afford them, and 2) grandfathering in people who do not have birth certificates? I think that, as a taxpayer, a voter ID card is not something I would mind making sure that people could get for free if they had to. And as far as the birth certificates, aren’t most people with this problem elderly? I doubt there are very many children born in the US any longer who don’t get them, and in the future this will be less & less of a problem.
I haven’t completely formed an opinion on this yet, but this part of the argument I can’t get my head around. The very conditions you describe as making it cumbersome for some to get a voter ID seem to also be conditions that make it impossible for them to demonstrate who they are, even in the absence of the need for an official voter ID. Someone without a passport, without a birth certificate, without a driver’s license–well, how do they prove who they are under any circumstances? And isn’t it reasonable under some circumstances to expect the person exercising the right to be able to prove that they are actually the person to whom that right belongs? If there is some other reasonably reliable, but less onerous, method of proving one’s identity, fine, let’s use that method.
Voter IDs, if they should be required, should be free of charge. The taxpayers will still, of course, bear the burden, but this will be indirect and will mean that those who pay more (or any) taxes will bear more of the burden. That’s just the way it has to be, IMO, if we are not to unduly restrict someone’s right to vote. Beyond the dollar cost, it would also have to be reasonably straightforward to get one. But it needn’t be absolutely effortless.
Cite?
For most people, a call and/or a letter to their state of births’ department of records will get one. States that have lost or destroyed the records have substitute documentation. Immigration records exist for those born in other countries.
This is not 1850. The notion that “many many” American citizens are living without a paper trail is absurd.
I agree.
You mean like a birth certificate?
I agree also.
I agree again.
Looks like we agree. What’s the arguement then?
I wouldn’t get tripped up over the absence of some birth certificates. If we expand the parameters to make it easy on everyone then we’ve done nothing to prevent the problems this is designed to prevent.
Verifying one’s “existence” isn’t the criterion on which getting a job, assistance or bank accounts is based. And even if you want to talk about “citizenship” wrt those issues, one does not have to be a citizen in order to open a bank account (or get a bank loan to buy a house, even), get a job (one only needs to be eligible to work in this country, which does not carry with it the right to vote if one is a resident alien with a green card but not full citizenship), or, believe it or not, qualify for public assistance (even resident aliens may qualify to get public aid).
In California the only “proof” one needs that they are a citizen eligible to vote, is their signature. [
I doubt that in today’s day and age of fraud, that getting a birth ciertificate is ‘easy’.
It may require some effort, but if that person wants to be treated like the rest of the population then they should make the effort to do so.
except you can’t use a birth cert as ID to vote with 
But that’s just the problem. No one has demonstrated that there is a problem that this is supposed to be preventing. No studies on voter fraud have been presented, nothing - just the whole illegals voting and terrorism scare tactics that the pubs fall back on for every issue.
I know this is anecdotal, but I have a coworker who was adopted and the birth cert was destroyed long ago and they are having a helluva time renewing the license.
As I said before my grandmother never had a birth certificate as her parnets never applied for one. She was born on their kitchen table so no hospital records either. She never had a photo ID in her life. Now fortunatly she was registered to vote in the same county from her 21st birthday to after her death. It’s entirely possible for older people to have no legal proof that they were born.
Cook County, I presume?
Lou Dobbs tonight told me that the evil Mexicans are going to vote by the millions. If Lou Dobbs says it, it must be true. Nobody has better foreigner-hating credentials than the Dobbster.
Ah, yes. Unnecessary rudeness is definitely a key point in debate. I’d forgotten.
I’m curious about your position regarding people who don’t have other ID. I mean, what if I don’t drive? I essentially have to pay $25 to vote, since I’d need to get a government-issued ID. Should ID be issued for free, lest we discourage voters?
Do you have any documentation for noncitizens voting in significant numbers, anywhere in the U.S.?
I see. You respond to the point I attempted to make with an snarky little analogy that implied my point was silly. When I vigorously and unapologetic ally defend my point and shoot down your incorrect analogy I am being rude. I think I’ll give that all the consideration it deserves.
IMO and without much statistical data I think we should make it as easy as possible for people of all races and economic stations to vote. If that means free IDs for those in low income levels then so be it. It’s about more than just a dollar amount. It’s about not making people jump through geographic or paperwork hoops in order to exercise their right to vote.
In fairness I don’t place all the responsibility on the government. People need to make a vigorous effort on their own behalf and as concerned citizens we can help each other. What we don’t need is laws designed to make it harder for certain groups disguised as something else. Does that seem reasonable?