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Originally Posted by DrPhil
(I posted the CBS News article on this.  ) |
You did indeed.
In my post-Christmas haze, I missed it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SWTXBelle
The problem I have with "there are no voter fraud problems" is that what should be said is "there have not been many documented voter fraud problems" or "the way we define voter fraud means there is none". I would argue that requiring id would prevent it, whether or not we have documented voter fraud.
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It doesn't work that way legally. Broadly speaking, if a state is going to impose a requirement that can have discriminatory effects, then to be able to defend itself against an Equal Protection claim under the Fourteenth Amendment, the state will have to show it has a compelling reason for imposing the requirement and that it tailored the requirement to meet that compelling reason but went no further. The possibility of voter fraud likely won't be good enough. The state will likely have to show that voter fraud is an actual, documented problem and that the photo ID requirement goes no further than necessary to address that problem.
The question I have is this: If the requirement of a photo ID doesn't keep people under 21 from getting fake IDs and buying cigarettes or alcohol, why do we think it will keep people who are determined to commit voter fraud from actually committing voter fraud? If you get past the first hurdle -- is this a real problem or not? -- you still have the second hurdle. Will this remedy, or at least lessen, the problem (without creating other problems)?
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