I have voted in every election since Senator McGovern ran for President in 1972 because I believe voting is the foundation of our democracy. In 2008 I sat in an Africa bus station waiting for my ballot after a long struggle figuring out how to vote no matter what the obstacles were. I am still not sure my vote was counted but I got the outcome I wanted and witnessed Africa’s response to the historical event.
When I returned home from Africa in 2010 the voting landscape was changing, I read story after story on voting ID laws passing, followed by law suites going all the way to the US Supreme Court. In 2013 in the Shelby County vs Holder case the US Supreme Court struck down a key provision in the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Under this provision jurisdictions with a history of discrimination would have to get pre-approval from the Justice Department before changing any voting rules.
Before this landmark decision 15 states were required to seek federal approval for any new voting rules. Mother Jones Magazine reported that 8 out of the 15 states passed or implemented new voting rules after this decision, Texas within two hours of the decision announced that the state’s voter identification law would immediately be implemented this law was previously blocked by a federal court under the provision that was struck down and soon after North Carolina pushed through a package of extreme voting restrictions.
The Brennan Center for Justice believes that the provision struck down prevented more than 700 voting changes between 1982 and 2006 because they were discriminatory.
The Brennan Center for Justice says the biggest impact following the Shelby decision has been at the local level and sited two examples. One was in Jacksonville Florida where a voting poll was moved from a well-attended African American neighborhood to a new location across town that had no access to public transportation. In Galveston County Texas all black and Latino constable and justice positions were eliminated a move that was previously blocked under the key provision of the 1965 Voter Rights Act that was struck down.
The other side of the voter restriction advocates are those trying to find ways to bust voter turnout. An independent agency, The Government Accountability Office that prepares reports for members of Congress conducted a study to see the correlation between voter ID requirements and voter turnout. The study found that ID requirement laws impacted both young people and African-American voter turnout in Kansas and Tennessee after the voter ID laws took effect in 2012.
Voter Turnout is alarming even without voter ID laws as an obstacle. According to a Seattle Times article only 39% of registered voters voted in the 2015 General Election. When you consider a candidate can win with 51% of the votes cast that means 20% of registered voters elect a candidate. For me this raises the stakes in voting and voting becomes a responsibility. Washington State is not alone in low voter turnout.
Debates over election regulations and voter turnout are not new. They have been a staple of discussions about elections and the state of our democracy since the birth of the United States. This debate has been heated up since the US Supreme Court’s land mark case and is being played out in the current election. Presidential candidate Donald Trump accused voters in Pennsylvania of potential cheating in the coming election and called for law enforcement to be present at the polls. Hillary Clinton’s campaign implemented a voter registration program with the goal of registering 3 million new voters. In the court system the federal appeals courts have overthrown or modified voter ID laws in North Carolina, Texas, Wisconsin, Ohio, and South Dakota in the last couple of months.
This tug-a-war of regulating voting and encourage voter turnout will continue in this fashion just as the people in this country are polarized into conflicting philosophies on most of the major issues, and congress cannot build consensus and show strong leadership to unite us in common goals.
I believe Voting is a right and have learned that voting is a responsibility which gives individual’s a way of participating in our democracy. I ask you please vote no matter what your political leanings are and please encourage everyone you know to vote.
