news of the day 3/11/05

Subject: news of the day 3/11/05

From: Rick Hasen

Date: 3/11/2005, 8:32 AM

To: election-law

More on What Voting is For

Following up on this post in which I criticized Jonah Goldberg's recent oped extolling the virtues of making it harder for people to vote, a blog reader writes:

Thanks for writing! The "enrichment" claim was not my defense for easy voting (the term appears in Goldberg's characterization of Sen. Clinton's voting bill). I talked about voting among "political equals." In my view, the question who counts as political equals is determined mostly by the political process itself (with a backstop role for the courts, as I've argued in my recent book). We don't view children as political equals, in part because, particularly for younger children, we can't trust them to exercise sound judgment. One might extend that argument to ex-felons, as another reader of my post suggested to me. I don't agree with the sentiment, but I understand it.
What I find indefensible about Goldberg (and those making similar arguments) is the idea that voting should be made difficult so as to weed out unintellgent voters ("uninformed louts"). I reject the idea that voting is like a test where we want only intelligent voters (informed non-louts?) to make choices for the rest of us. Presumably Goldberg would favor some kind of literacy test or other device to separate out good from bad voters. It is that sentiment I find unacceptable. At least among the universe of adult, citizen, resident, competent non-felons (and we can argue if those categories should be narrowed further), I stenuously disagree with arguments to impose further voter qualifications, particularly those based on supposed intelligence. Moreover, even if one wanted to impose an intelligence test, using a byzantine registration system hardly seems the best way to separate the intelligent from the uninformed louts.

Revised Version of SSRC Paper on Exit Polls Now Available

SSRC has posted A Review of Recent Controversies Concerning 2004 Presidential Exit Polls. The paper is written by Michael Traugott, Benjamin Highton, and Henry Brady. SSRC has also begun a listserv for election reform scholars which you can join here.

New Bush v. Gore Paper

Jason C. Glahn has posted Bush v. Gore From Behind a Veil of Ignorance: Why Election 2000 was Ethical (and Legal Too) on SSRN (forthcoming, Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy. Here is the abstract:

In this article, I defend the result of Election 2000 by arguing that Article II and the Fourteenth Amendment operate as "veil rules" and should be interpreted to prevent alterations in the standard for a legal vote after the fact. Because a uniform standard for vote counting is required, I argue that only the machine recounts initially mandated by Florida law were a permissible way to resolve the election. The nature of veil of ignorance rules within constitutional jurisprudence and their usefulness in upholding the rule of law is also investigated in some detail.
The posted draft is a good reminder for those using Microsoft Word to be sure to "accept all changes" when tracking changes before converting a document to pdf.

"Drug companies' PAC gives big after Schwarzenegger's vetoes"

A.P. offers this report.

"Georgia House Passes New Map"

Roll Call offers this breaking news report, "In a vote with national implications, the Georgia House passed a newly proposed Congressional map this afternoon, clearing a major hurdle for state Republicans seeking to undo the lines they argue were unfairly drawn by Democrats in 2001. Democrats in the Georgia Congressional delegation have vowed to fight this rare mid-decade redistricting effort in court, charging that the new map dilutes the overall strength of minority voters and violates the spirit of the 1965 Voting Rights Act." (paid subscription required)

-- 
Professor Rick Hasen 
Loyola Law School 
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