Quote:
Originally Posted by Kevin
But if you have, for example, registered a bunch of fake names or the Dallas Cowboys offensive line as voters and intend to vote in their place, obtaining these documents is going to not be impossible, but it's going to be a lot more trouble than it's worth.
Having all of these other documents work to satisfy the requirement of ID does sidestep the cost argument. Those documents either have been issued to you at one point for free or are being issued to you every month.
If you can't get something on that list, you have bigger problems than voting. Ensuring the validity of the vote exceeds the nominal trouble some nominal minority of voters will have to go through in order to vote.
|
This is exactly my issue though - "more trouble than it's worth"? We don't even have any idea of whether voter fraud of the type you've noted is widespread - how can we have any idea of how much "trouble" those willing to defraud the vote will go through?
Beyond that, I love how the number potentially disenfranchised is "nominal" but we have a tight handle on how much trouble people will or won't go through to commit fraud.
Either way though, you're vastly overstating the difficulty of coming up with a reasonable-looking utility bill or pay stub. I just checked, and Word2010 has templates that would allow me to print my own, right now. There's no "deterrent" effect if you allow those other forms of (free) identification, and clearly those are included to attempt to remain Constitutional. Nobody at a polling place will be able to say "wait, that's not a valid paystub!" or "that water bill looks Photoshopped!"
Even if you stick to state IDs, you can show out of state ID, or college ID! You could fake those from the public library. Literally, you.
So again, quite simply: what exactly is this law doing? Those who wish to vote fraudulently still can, easily (and that's assuming there is even widespread fraud to begin with). Some people, though, just don't get to vote.
Saying "well, too bad for them, they should have ____" is pretty poor - it's kind of a fundamental right.