The fight to protect voting rights celebrated a victory last fall in the Indiana State Court of Appeals. There, the court struck down what has become known as the strictest voter identification law in the country.
But it’s an election year again, and, as Tova Wang points out at TPM, it's not over in the Hoosier state.
An Indiana state court recently struck down the state's voter ID law, the most restrictive ID law in the country, and the Indiana State Supreme Court has just announced it will hear arguments on appeal March 4.
And that's not the only place voter ID laws are cropping up:
At least nine states and a city in Massachusetts (of all places!) are considering bills introduced in January 2010 that make identification requirements for voting more strict and/or require proof of citizenship in order to register to vote. As usual, the debates are partisan. This is particularly true in South Carolina where it is estimated that 178,000 South Carolinians do not have the photo identification they would need to vote under the proposal.
There has yet to be any proof of significant voter fraud, but it seems to be political concerns, not principle, pushing these initiatives forward.
Instead of working to suppress the votes of American citizens, perhaps these legislators could help fix the real problems in the nation’s flawed voter and electoral systems--systems that are integral to our democracy.