Earlier
this week, Cleveland Tea Party Patriots learned about the initiatives to require
Photo IDs in order to vote. Chris Long addressed the issue as it concerns voter
fraud as opposed to voter integrity. Ohio voters can take a look at a recent development
on a voter ID law in Wisconsin, via Hot Air:
Surprise: SCOTUS upholds Wisconsin voter-ID law
POSTED AT 12:01 PM ON
MARCH 23, 2015 BY ED MORRISSEY
Or maybe not such a surprise after
all. The path to today’s Supreme Court decision to refuse an appeal by the ACLU
against Wisconsin’s voter-ID law has been strewn with appellate decisions that supported its implementation,
although a last-minute stay by SCOTUS kept it out of play for the midterms.
The law will fully take effect for the 2016 election, which may complicate
efforts by Democrats to keep the state blue:
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday left intact a new
Republican-backed law in Wisconsin that requires voters to present photo
identification when they cast ballots.
The court declined to hear an appeal filed by the American Civil
Liberties Union, which challenged the law. …
A federal judge blocked the state’s voter ID law in March 2012
soon after it took effect and entered a permanent injunction in April, finding
the measure would deter or prevent a substantial number of voters who lack
photo identification from casting ballots, and place an unnecessary burden on
the poor and minorities.
The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the decision and
subsequently ruled in October that the law was constitutional. Wisconsin’s
Supreme Court upheld the voter ID law in a separate ruling.
The SCOTUS stay in October had more to do with the timing of the
law, thanks to the scheduling of the challenges through the courts. Regardless,
the election still went in favor of Scott Walker and the GOP, preventing
Democrats from repealing the voter-ID provision before it could come into
effect.
This will put a
huge dent in the Obama administration’s efforts to squelch voter-ID laws in
other states. In order to grant certiorari, the ACLU would have needed four justices
to vote to add it to the docket. The fact that they couldn’t even move the
liberal wing to unite against a voter-ID law shows that the justices consider
the issue settled. Requirements for identification at polling stations are
legitimate, in the eyes of the court, as long as enough options for no-cost
qualifying ID exist to keep the poor from being disenfranchised.
The dismissal of this challenge to the law will also help boost
Walker’s efforts outside of Wisconsin. He’s known for reforming the
public-employee unions, balancing the budget, and most recently for signing
Right to Work legislation even if he advised the Republican-controlled
legislature to move more slowly on the latter. Some forget that Walker backed
the voter-ID legislation as part of his reform package that got him elected in
2010, and then reconfirmed in 2012 and re-elected again in 2014. It gives
Walker an argument to position himself as the reformer who has a real track
record of conservative change in a purple state, change that could turn the
state red for good.
However, the
Supreme Court decision isn’t keeping the ACLU fromdemanding yet another delay, on the same basis as the last
one:
The Wisconsin state elections board says it is awaiting direction
from the state Department of Justice about what comes next now that the U.S.
Supreme Court has refused to hear a challenge to the state’s voter
identification law.
The American Civil Liberties Union asked a federal appeals court
to block implementation of the law for the April 7 election.
If the ACLU gets its waiver, it had better enjoy it — because it
will be its last.
Update: It’s more
accurate to say that the refusal to grant cert in this case upholds the law rather than approves it,
although functionally it’s the same thing. I’ve changed the headline from
“approves” to “upholds.”
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