In my life as a white, middle class American, I’ve been failed by businesses, relationships and religious dogma. But I never imagined that the thing I most believed in would collapse the day my Democracy failed.

For nearly 18 months, I worked to get a minor party candidate’s name on the state ballot. To me, it represented an opportunity to put an intelligent, energetic person in public office, to the party, it meant a chance for future ballot access and to every voter, it offered another choice on Election Day.

(click on the link above to read the rest at Kathleen’s blog — Yes, do it; I didn’t quote the best part, only the beginning.)

“The trend has been worse, worse, worse, worse in your state.”

– Richard Winger, Ballot Access News
[with thanks to Tom Brown]

By IAN URBINA
Published: January 7, 2008

INDIANAPOLIS — In April 2006, a federal judge upheld Indiana’s law on voter identification, the strictest in the nation, saying there was no evidence that it would prevent any voter from having his ballot counted.

Valerie Williams, a Republican, says she was similarly left out.

But on Election Day last November, Valerie Williams became that evidence, according to lawyers in a case that will be argued Wednesday before the Supreme Court. After Ms. Williams grabbed her cane that day and walked into the polling station in the lobby of her retirement home to vote, as she has done in at least the last two elections, she was barred from doing so.

The election officials at the polling place, whom she had known for years, told her she could not cast a regular ballot. They said the forms of identification she had always used — a telephone bill, a Social Security letter with her address on it and an expired Indiana driver’s license — were no longer valid under the voter ID law, which required a current state-issued photo identification card.

“Of course I threw a fit,” said Ms. Williams, 61, who was made to cast a provisional ballot instead, which, according to voting records, was never counted. Ms. Williams — who has difficulty walking — said she was not able to get a ride to the voting office to prove her identity within 10 days as required under the law, and her ballot was discarded.

The incident is at the heart of the highly anticipated case, which challenges the constitutionality of the Indiana law and, according to Daniel P. Tokaji, a professor of law at Ohio State University, is “the most important case involving the mechanics of election administration in decades.”

The case goes before the Supreme Court just as the 2008 presidential primaries are beginning. The court will deliver a decision by late June, in time to affect the November elections.

Supporters of the law, most of them Republicans, say a requirement for a state photo identification card is a prudent step toward curbing voter fraud. They say the requirement helps to restore confidence in the voting process by removing the potential for fraud, though Indiana has never cited a case of “voter impersonation,” which is what the law is supposed to prevent.

Opponents of the law, most of them Democrats, view voter identification requirements as a deterrent that disproportionately affects poor, minority and elderly voters, who more often than other people lack the required forms of identification and who also tend to back Democrats. And unlike supporters of the law, they say they have evidence to bolster their case and show that it has harmed Indiana voters.

A brief filed with the Supreme Court by the Marion County Board of Elections, the state’s largest voting jurisdiction and a defendant in the case, said Ms. Williams — who is a black Republican — and 31 other voters had to cast provisional ballots because they showed up at the polls without the state-required ID, which can include a driver’s license, a passport, a state-issued ID or some other government-issued photo identification. Because they also failed to appear later at county offices with the identification required to validate their identities, all of these voters had their ballots thrown out, records show. In interviews, many of these voters said they could not find transportation or could not afford the IDs.

All of these voters appeared at the polling place for the precinct in which they were registered, and all of the signatures on their provisional-ballot envelopes matched the appropriate poll book signatures. At least 14 of these voters had voted in 10 elections before last year, according to voting records.

Last year, legislators in 27 states proposed laws like the one in Indiana, seeking to increase identification requirements for registration or voting, according to Justin Levitt, a lawyer for the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law. Mr. Levitt predicted legislative and legal battles in at least that many states, depending on how the Supreme Court ruled.

But the decision will affect more than just the voter-identification issue.

In the 1980s and ’90s, the Supreme Court came up with a test for assessing any law that placed hurdles before voters. The justices ruled that courts must weigh the value of the law to the state against the burden it placed on voters.

How the court applies that test in this case could set the standard for challenges to election rules across the country. The decision could affect a range of other voting-related rules being imposed by states, including ones involving the handling of provisional ballots, new restrictions on voter registration and the methods states can use to purge voters from registration rolls.

Professor Tokaji, who was hired by the federal Election Assistance Commission to help produce a report released last year on voter-identification requirements, said that Arizona, for example, would study the court’s ruling to see whether it could continue to require voters to present either one photo ID or two forms of nonphoto ID. Similarly, in Ohio, litigation is pending over such matters as how old a utility bill can be for a voter to use it as identification.

Supporters of the law said the requirement was hardly burdensome in today’s society.

“It is exceedingly difficult to maneuver in today’s America without a photo ID (try flying, or even entering a tall building such as the courthouse in which we sit, without one),” wrote Judge Richard A. Posner in a January 2007 opinion by the Seventh United States Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago upholding the Indiana law and affirming a 2007 decision by Sarah Evans Barker, a federal district court judge. “And as a consequence, the vast majority of adults have such identification.”

The Bush administration, arguing in favor of the law in a brief filed with the Supreme Court, suggested it was not necessary to prove fraud was actually taking place, given the importance of preventing such fraud.

“The state’s interest in deterring voter fraud before it happens is evident from the monumental harm that can come from such fraud,” the brief said.

Opponents of the law point to the three states — Georgia, Michigan and Missouri — where state officials have recently conducted the most systematic studies on the topic. Those states found that at least 4 percent of registered voters lacked the type of ID needed under the strictest voter identification laws. A 2007 study by political scientists at the University of Washington found that about 13 percent of registered voters in Indiana lacked the required identification.

Studies on whether voter identification laws affect turnout have come to different conclusions, some finding an impact, especially on members of minorities, and some finding no impact. All of the studies have acknowledged limitations on their conclusions given that strict photo ID requirements have only been in place in a few states for a few elections.

Only Florida, Georgia and Indiana require a voter to present photo identification to cast a regular ballot. Other states allow other types of documentation, like utility bills or a sworn affidavit from the voter. Twenty-three states in effect do not require proof of identification of all voters, requiring only what federal law demands: only first-time voters who apply by mail and have not otherwise been verified by the state must prove their identity with documentation.

Mary-Jo Criswell, 71, who, like Ms. Williams is an Indiana voter cited in the case before the Supreme Court, had her vote thrown out in November after she was told the identification she had used in previous elections — a bank card with a photograph, a utility bill and a phone bill — no longer sufficed.

“It was particularly galling for me since I was a former voting precinct committeewoman and I, of all people, should not be missing an election,” said Ms. Criswell, who is a Democrat.

“It’s like I’m having to recreate my identity and build a paper trail after all these years of never having problems,” she said, explaining that her epilepsy had prevented her from ever getting a driver’s license. Her passport expired in the 1950s, she said, and she did not have a copy of her birth certificate last November.

Since last November’s election, she said, she has obtained a copy of her birth certificate but has still not gotten the required photo ID.

http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071118/NEWS0107/711180401/1075

County election officials say the number of voters lost through Florida’s central registration system is small — 90 percent of applications get voter cards.

The result is applications from more than 43,000 Floridians hoping to become eligible voters over the past 21 months were rejected by state computer programs and kicked out for special review.

More than 14,000 initially rejected — three-quarters of them minorities — didn’t make it through that last set of hoops.

Blacks were 6 1/2 times more likely than whites to be rejected at that step.

Hispanics were more than 7 times more likely to be failed.

Greens cite de facto “poll tax”
Full, accurate count of all the votes will cost thousands of dollars

Green candidates for municipal offices in last week’s election today said their offer of volunteer help in securing a full, accurate count of all write-in votes was rejected by St. Joseph County Election Board chairperson James Korpal. The Greens reported that Korpal informed them that there is no legal procedure available for allowing volunteers to take part in a counting of votes.

Korpal also said there are no plans to count the more than 300 write-in votes that were cast in races that included registered write-in candidates but have yet to be attributed to a specific candidate. According to Korpal a formal recount would be necessary to address the issue of these 300 votes, likely resulting in costs of several thousand dollars that would be incurred by the Green candidates.

“The idea that we have to should have to pay thousands of dollars to get a full count amounts to a de facto poll tax on write-in voters and candidates, ” said write-in South Bend Mayoral candidate Tom Brown. “St. Joseph County didn’t have the equipment necessary to follow Indiana election law and the consequence is that write-in candidates are likely being denied more than 60% of our votes.”

Indiana election law requires that all votes be counted and attributed to all registered candidates. The St. Joseph County Election Board devised a plan requiring voters casting write-in votes to place their ballots in a separate auxiliary bin in order to allow for a hand count. Ballots that are scanned directly into the voting machines register the existence of a write-in vote, but because these ballots are placed in the sealed ballot box after being read by the voting machine, there is no way to determine what has been written-in and, therefore, no way to legally attribute these write-in votes to a specific person.

Greens reported widespread breaches of voter privacy, confusing and conflicting directions for write-in voters, and the tallying of write-in votes in public view stemming from this year’s municipal elections.

Election Board officials have stated that specialized equipment called a “diverter” is necessary to allow all ballots to be placed into the voting machine with those containing write-in votes to be separated so that they can be hand counted. The cost of a diverter, according to Board officials, is $3,000 per machine and would be necessary for all voting machines in use across the county.

“This is an example where Indiana’s restrictive ballot access laws are forcing independent and third party candidates into write-in candidacies, ” said Karl Hardy, write-in candidate for at-large South Bend Common Council. “The reality is that Indiana is out of step with the national standards of ballot access and this is creating a mess in terms of counting write-in votes and adhering to the principle that all votes be counted with the same standard.”

Indiana’s threshold for signatures necessary for ballot access was quadrupled in the early 1980s from one half of one percent to 2 percent of the total votes cast in the most recent Indiana Secretary of State’s race. Furthermore, the deadline for turning in these signatures has been moved earlier and earlier from its original date of 20 days before then election to its current July 1st position.

“These problems with ballot access and write-in votes are not going away, ” said Hardy. “Next year is a presidential election year and we’re certain to go through this again.” <P> Similar problems occurred in the last general election held in November 2006 when approximately 500 votes cast for three registered write-in candidates were never attributed to them.

For more information:

Karl Hardy

votegreenmichiana@gmail.com

www.votegreenmichiana.wordpress.com

www.sjvgreens.org

For more, go to http://www.brennancenter.org/press_detail.asp?key=51&subkey=50867

By DAVID ESPO – Sep 26, 2007

WASHINGTON (AP) — A voter seeking to cast a ballot is first told to produce a photo ID. Is that intimidation or a prudent safeguard against election fraud?

The Supreme Court said Tuesday it intends to decide, stepping into a controversy that blends race, partisan politics and the Constitution.

Officially, the justices said they would consider a challenge to the constitutionality of an Indiana law. But several other states have enacted various forms of voter ID legislation in the past five years, and the court’s ruling could affect them, as well.

“Indiana’s voter identification law is currently the most onerous in effect in the nation,” opponents alleged in legal papers filed with the court. They contended that “the restrictive conditions imposed in Indiana are a harbinger of future regulations” elsewhere, and urged the justices to rule before the 2008 elections.

Despite the claim of unconstitutionality, a federal judge upheld the Indiana measure, and an appeals court did likewise. “The purpose of the Indiana law is to reduce voting fraud, and voting fraud impairs the right of legitimate voters to vote by diluting their votes,” Judge Richard Posner wrote in his majority opinion.

Even if the Supreme Court settles the legal issue, it is unlikely to end the political combat that often surrounds such legislation.

The Indiana law was passed by a Republican-controlled Legislature and signed by a Republican governor over the objections of many Democrats. The constitutional challenge was brought by the state Democratic Party, a county Democratic committee and two Democratic office holders, as well as organizations including the NAACP.

Underscoring the national political alignment, the Republican National Committee’s official Web site includes a section devoted to recent cases of alleged voter fraud. Following the court’s announcement, an aide directed reporters to a recent posting on two guilty pleas last week in cases of voter fraud in Indiana.

A spokesman for the Republican National Committee responded cautiously to the court’s announcement. “We are pleased that the Supreme Court is bringing attention to this important issue,” said Danny Diaz.

“This is another step to ensure that every citizen who is eligible to vote will have that right and their vote will count.”

Donna Brazile, a Democratic strategist who heads the DNC Voting Rights Institute, likened voter ID requirements to a “modern-day poll tax” designed to disenfranchise black and poor voters.

“Some of us in the voting rights community are very nervous because we fear the court will make matters worse,” she added.

Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, the House Democratic whip and highest ranking black member of Congress, added that “combatting voting fraud is best addressed through measures that modernize our voting technologies and ensure transparency in our election system, not by enacting laws that deter minorities and others from casting their votes.”

Seeking the Supreme Court hearing, critics of the law asserted in legal papers that evidence “shows that this voter identification requirement will deter eligible citizens from voting.” They added that Indiana enacted its law “without any showing that it responds to an actual problem in an appropriately tailored manner.”

Lawyers on the other side, representing the secretary of state and other officials, unsuccessfully urged the justices not to accept the case for review.

Even so, Secretary of State Todd Rokita, a Republican and defendant in the case, said he was confident about the final outcome.

“This case has been through the courts and more importantly, it’s been in the court called Election Day,” he said.

Before the law’s passage, an Indiana voter had only to sign a poll book at the polling place, where a photo copy of the voter’s signature was kept on file for comparison.

Courts have upheld voter ID laws in Arizona, Michigan and, most recently, Georgia, but struck down one in Missouri.

The cases are Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, 07-21, and Indiana Democratic Party v. Rokita, 07-25.

Associated Press writers Mark Sherman in Washington and Mike Smith in Indianapolis contributed to this report.

October 8, 2007

Write-in candidates prepare for Election Board decision
Voter intent, uniform treatment of all voters at issue

All three registered write-in candidates issued a joint statement signaling their intention to attend the next meeting of the St. Joseph County Election Board scheduled for this Wednesday October 10. The write-in candidates requested clarification as to what standard of “voter intent” would be used to judge write-in votes cast in the upcoming November 6 municipal elections.

During the board’s September meeting the Democratic co-chairperson, James Korpal, told Karl Hardy, a Green Party write-in candidate for South Bend Common Council At-Large, to expect a decision against interpreting writing in “Green” or “Green Party” as sufficient indication of a voter’s intent to vote for the three Green Party write-in candidates.

Besides Hardy, both Dave Vollrath (Mishawaka Common Council At-Large) and Tom Brown (Mayor of South Bend) are Green Party write-in candidates. The Indiana Green Party does not have what is commonly known as “ballot access” that would automatically have Green candidates’ names placed on ballots.

“We recognize the Election Board is likely to act on the advice of Indiana state Election Division officials and turn down our request,” said Hardy. “I’m holding some hope, however, that the board will consider our statements and exercise their ability to interpret voter intent according to the spirit of Indiana statute.”

Hardy and the other two candidates pointed to Indiana Code 3.12.1.1 that includes the following:

“…the primary factor to be considered in determining a voter’s choice on a ballot is the intent of the voter. If the voter’s intent can be determined on the ballot or on part of the ballot, the vote shall be counted for the affected candidate or candidates or on the public question. However, if it is impossible to determine a voter’s choice of candidates on a part of a ballot or vote on a public question, then the voter’s vote concerning those candidates or public questions may not be counted.”

“The fact is that straight ticket ballots accounted for a whopping 47% of votes cast in St. Joseph County during the last municipal election in 2003,” said Hardy. “Why should my opponents have votes counted for them based solely on a voter’s selection of straight ticket “Republican” or “Democrat” without having to specify an individual or office? If straight ticket voting is sufficient for “voter intent,” why will an individual who writes in “Green” or “Green Party,” for the specific offices in which Greens are running as write-ins, have his or her vote thrown out?”

At stake, the Greens argued, is a citizen’s fundamental right to cast a vote and have it counted, a right that has been routinely affirmed by the US Supreme Court. (*1) The Greens also asserted the US Supreme Court regularly considers (*2) whether or not states permit write-in votes when evaluating the burden imposed by election laws governing ballot access for minor party candidates.

“When there only a relatively few number of competitive races both locally and around the state, the barriers to entry into the election process become that much more glaring,” said Vollrath. “Independents and third parties in Indiana often have to resort to write-in campaigns. It is very important the Indiana election law be clear and provide for an equal standard for all votes- write-in or not- for all candidates, in all races.”

The candidates stressed their desire to work with the county election board but said they were not overly optimistic given the board’s treatment of nearly 500 write-in votes cast for three registered write-in candidates in the last general election held in St. Joseph County (2006). Election board members refused to acknowledge any wrongdoing and suggested the Greens “see an attorney” when pressed for an explanation as to why 181 votes apparently cast for the Green Party candidate for Secretary of State, Bill Stant, were not counted.

“We’re hoping to find a resolution to this particular matter but we’re in this for the long haul,” said Brown. “These issues are bigger than our candidacies, bigger than the Green Party, and bigger than South Bend or St. Joseph County.”

:::::
Contact:
Karl Hardy
South Bend
http://www.votegreenmichiana.wordpress.com
votegreenmichiana@gmail.com
:::::

*1. See Bush v. Gore – 2000 (“Having once granted the right to vote on equal terms, the state may not, by later arbitrary and disparate treatment, value one person’s vote over that of another.); Gray v. Sanders -1964 (“all qualified voters have a constitutionally protected right to cast their ballots and have them counted.”); South v. Peters –1950 (“The right to vote includes the right to have the ballot counted.”)

*2. See Jenness v. Fortson- 1971 (upholding Georgia law in part because the law permitted write-in votes); Williams v. Rhodes-1968 (striking down Ohio law in part because the law banned write-in votes); Burdick v. Takushi- 1992 (upholding ban on write-in votes because Hawaii provides candidates “easy access to the ballot.”)