[EL] Civil Rights Voting Restoration Act

[Michael P McDonald]

The article I believe I am referring to is:

Hjalmarsson, Randi and Mark Lopez. 2010. "The Voting Behavior of Young Disenfranchised Felons: Would They Vote if They Could?" American Law and Economics Review 12(2):265-279.

http://aler.oxfordjournals.org/content/12/2/356.abstract

I reviewed an anonymous version of a similar article. Regrettably, I don't seem to have electronic access through my university to the journal - which is surprising since it is an Oxford journal - so I can't verify.

This recent working paper by Meredith and Morse appears to challenge the article, and has lots of good references:

http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~marcmere/workingpapers/IowaFelons.pdf

For the record, I believe that a democracy works best when all persons are engaged, regardless of their partisanship, so I am naturally supportive of automatic restoration of felon voting rights. I further support felon enfranchisement for even prisoners, as is the policy in some Western democracies and was Massachusetts policy until 2000 -- tongue in cheek, the GOTV operation must have been interesting!

============
Dr. Michael P. McDonald
Associate Professor
George Mason University
4400 University Drive - 3F4
Fairfax, VA 22030-4444

phone:   703-993-4191 (office)
e-mail:  dr.michael.p.mcdonald at gmail.com                
web:     http://elections.gmu.edu
twitter: @ElectProject


-----Original Message-----
From: Smith, Brad [mailto:BSmith at law.capital.edu] 
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2014 11:42 AM
To: Michael P McDonald; Election Law
Subject: RE: [EL] Civil Rights Voting Restoration Act

Michael,

Is your comment based on data or supposition, i.e. does the research show only that white collar criminals are more likely to vote, or does it also show that, once voting, they also vote Republican? I ask because I recall reading somewhere a while back that white collar criminals tended to vote Democratic - Leona Helmsley, Michael Millkin, etc. But that may also have just been anecdotal.

Also, I presume (perhaps incorrectly) that white collar criminals are a relatively small minority of those whose voting rights would be restored, so even if they voted Republican, and voted in higher percentages, the net effect of Paul's bill could be a substantial Democratic edge. 

For the record, I think felons who have otherwise served their sentences should have voting rights restored.

Bradley A. Smith
Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault 
  Professor of Law
Capital University Law School
303 East Broad Street
Columbus, OH 43215
(614) 236-6317
bsmith at law.capital.edu
http://www.law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.asp

-----Original Message-----
From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Michael P McDonald
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2014 11:19 AM
To: Election Law
Subject: Re: [EL] Civil Rights Voting Restoration Act

Counter-intuitively, research suggests that this law would on balance benefit Republicans since the types of felons most likely to take advantage of restoration would be higher income "white" collar criminals (double-entendre intended).

============
Dr. Michael P. McDonald
Associate Professor
George Mason University
4400 University Drive - 3F4
Fairfax, VA 22030-4444

phone:   703-993-4191 (office)
e-mail:  dr.michael.p.mcdonald at gmail.com                
web:     http://elections.gmu.edu
twitter: @ElectProject

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Easley, Billy (Paul)
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2014 11:01 AM
To: Election Law
Subject: Re: [EL] Civil Rights Voting Restoration Act

Ugh, I meant to say "felons" not "fans".although I'm sure former felons are fans of the legislation.

- 

Billy James Easley II
Legislative Counsel
Senator Rand Paul
8-6912


From: <Easley>, Billy Easley <billy_easley at paul.senate.gov>
Date: Wednesday, June 25, 2014 at 10:59 AM
To: Election Law <Law-election at department-lists.uci.edu>
Subject: [EL] Civil Rights Voting Restoration Act

On Sunday, Senator Rand Paul announced that he will be introducing a voting rights law that restores the right to vote to non-violent fans in federal elections. There are 2 million American citizens in this country who have had their political voices silenced at the voting booth even though they've served their time in jail and paid their debt to society. In eleven states there are severe restrictions and onerous procedural hurdles that these citizens would need to overcome to get their right to vote back. In four of those eleven states, the ability to regain the right to vote is foreclosed forever to those with a felony record. 

Due to Richardson v. Ramirez and it's progeny there is great deal of jurisprudence that supports the ability of states to disenfranchise felons under the Other Crimes Exception of the Fourteenth Amendment. I was aware of this long before the legislation was written and have my own arguments against it but since some commentators are hammering this again (http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/381072/unconstitutional-bill-rand-paul-roger-clegg) I wanted to see if you folks had any thoughts about this. Specifically, whether you think Ramirez is fatal to such legislation. _______________________________________________
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