[EL] Breaking News: Texas voter id decided: analysis
Rick Hasen
rhasen at law.uci.edu
Thu Aug 30 09:48:39 PDT 2012
Some analysis:
Breaking News: Federal Court Holds Texas Voter ID Law Violates
Voting Rights Act [Now Updated with Analysis]
<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=39379>
Posted on August 30, 2012 8:59 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=39379>
by Rick Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
You can read the unanimous 56-page opinion by Judge Tatel at this link.
<http://electionlawblog.org/wp-content/uploads/texas-voter-id.pdf>
The court has put in a scheduling order to address at a later date
whether section 5 of the Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional.
1. This is a careful, unanimous opinion from a three-judge court which
rejects most of the social science evidence submitted by both sides on
whether Texas's voter id law imposes greater burdens on minority voters.
Instead, the court bases its analysis on three basically uncontested
facts: (1) Minority voters are at least proportionately as likely as
white voters in Texas to lack the documents needed for Texas's new id
law (which the Court calls perhaps the most "stringent" in the nation;
(2) the new i.d. law will put high burdens on poor people who lack id
(many of whom would have to travel up to 200 or 250 miles at their own
expense to get the i.d. as well as pay at least $22 for the documents
needed to get the i.d.; and (3) minority voters in Texas are more likely
to be poor. Using this simple structure, the court concludes that
Texas, which bears the burden of proof in a section 5 case, cannot prove
its law won't make the position of protected minorities worse off. And
the court suggests this was a problem of its own making: Texas could
have made the i.d. law less onerous (as in Georgia, which the court
suggests DOJ was probably right to preclear) and Texas could have done
more to produce evidence supporting its side at trial, but it engaged in
bad trial tactics.
2. Texas is likely to appeal this case to the Supreme Court, and I would
expect to see an application for an emergency injunction allowing Texas
to use its voter id law during the upcoming election. If this happens,
this will be a major question for the Roberts Court, and it would have
to be decided in short order. Given the closeness to the election, it
is not clear to me that even if the Supreme Court disagrees on some of
the analysis with the district court that it would grant such emergency
relief. This is a big unknown.
3. There is still the constitutional question to address: Texas argued
that if section 5 bars Texas from putting an id law in place, Section 5
is unconstitutional. The district court issued a scheduling order to
address this question at a later date, but given the DC Circuit's
/Shelby County/ case I cannot see how this district court does anything
but conclude it is bound to say section 5 is unconstitutional (unless
and until the Supreme Court takes /Shelby County /and says otherwise).
4. The court was very careful to show that not all voter id laws are
created equal, that states may have ample good reasons to impose voter
id laws, and that such laws can be put in place in ways which do not
discriminate against minority voters. Not only did the court suggest
that Georgia's voter id law was probably ok; the analysis here could
well be key in how the separate district court hearing the challenge to
South Carolina's voter id law will resolve that case. It is certainly
possible that South Carolina's law could be precleared, especially given
some key concessions <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=39255>this week at
trial.
5. The court does a very good job illustrating the problems with social
science methods in trying to figure out just how many people lack voter
ids. It rejected evidence from both sides, and it does show just how
hard it is to get a handle on the relationship between voter id and turnout.
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<http://www.addtoany.com/share_save#url=http%3A%2F%2Felectionlawblog.org%2F%3Fp%3D39379&title=Breaking%20News%3A%20Federal%20Court%20Holds%20Texas%20Voter%20ID%20Law%20Violates%20Voting%20Rights%20Act%20%5BNow%20Updated%20with%20Analysis%5D&description=>
Posted in Department of Justice <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=26>,
voter id <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=9>, Voting Rights Act
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=15> | Comments Off
On 8/30/12 9:00 AM, Rick Hasen wrote:
>
>
> Breaking News: Federal Court Holds Texas Voter ID Law Violates
> Voting Rights Act <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=39379>
>
> Posted on August 30, 2012 8:59 am
> <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=39379> by Rick Hasen
> <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
>
> You can read the unanimous 56-page opinion by Judge Tatel at this
> link. <http://electionlawblog.org/wp-content/uploads/texas-voter-id.pdf>
>
> The court has put in a scheduling order to address at a later date
> whether section 5 of the Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional.
>
> [This post will be updated with analysis soon.]
>
> Share
> <http://www.addtoany.com/share_save#url=http%3A%2F%2Felectionlawblog.org%2F%3Fp%3D39379&title=Breaking%20News%3A%20Federal%20Court%20Holds%20Texas%20Voter%20ID%20Law%20Violates%20Voting%20Rights%20Act&description=>
> Posted in Department of Justice <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=26>,
> voter id <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=9>, Voting Rights Act
> <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=15> | Comments Off |
> --
> Rick Hasen
> Chancellor's Professor of Law and Political Science
> UC Irvine School of Law
> 401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
> Irvine, CA 92697-8000
> 949.824.3072 - office
> 949.824.0495 - fax
> rhasen at law.uci.edu
> http://law.uci.edu/faculty/page1_r_hasen.html
> http://electionlawblog.org
> Now available: The Voting Wars:http://amzn.to/y22ZTv
>
>
>
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--
Rick Hasen
Chancellor's Professor of Law and Political Science
UC Irvine School of Law
401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
Irvine, CA 92697-8000
949.824.3072 - office
949.824.0495 - fax
rhasen at law.uci.edu
http://law.uci.edu/faculty/page1_r_hasen.html
http://electionlawblog.org
Now available: The Voting Wars: http://amzn.to/y22ZTv
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