For more than a half century, the U.S. Supreme Court interpreted voting law in a way that encouraged voting and access to the polls. But no longer. The court's recent ruling in an Indiana voter-identification case reversed the modern court's role as a champion of voting rights. Instead, the conservative-majority court has swung to the other side. This court is doing what states once did: making it more difficult for citizens to participate in their democracy.
Congress, which sought to promote voting rights with the Help America to Vote Act of 2002, should restore ease of access to the ballot. This should be a legislative priority after November's elections. Nothing is more important than voting to ensure a robust democracy. Only Florida, Georgia and Indiana currently require picture IDs, but the court decision will embolden others to change.
An easy choice
The Indiana case presented the Supreme Court with an easy choice. It could follow legal precedent established with the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which outlawed poll taxes, literacy tests and other barriers that states -- mostly Southern -- erected to suppress votes, especially of African Americans. The other option was for the court to support Indiana's restrictive law that requires voters to have a government-issued photo ID. Regrettably, the court chose the latter in a 6-3 vote.
Indiana had passed the photo-ID law in 2005, ostensibly to prevent voter fraud even though there was no documented evidence that voter fraud actually was a problem. On the other hand, there was plenty of evidence that the strict photo-ID requirement will be difficult for some people, especially the elderly, the disabled and some segments of Hispanic and black populations. It is true that for most people, producing a photo-ID isn't a problem. But a retired or disabled person who doesn't drive will find that getting an official ID can be difficult.
Many states issue official photo IDs to nondrivers, but getting one of these requires having a passport, birth certificate or other document that some people don't have. For these people, getting that government-issued photo-ID will be time-consuming and costly. No doubt, some won't bother to try to get one, or will give up in frustration.
This is the kind of obstacle that the 1965 voting-rights law was designed to erase. For more than a century, states had suppressed the black vote by requiring special fees, poll taxes, literacy tests, etc. They gerrymandered districts, established primaries for whites only and created many hurdles to prevent blacks from voting.
An unsympathetic court
During oral arguments in January, Chief Justice John Roberts indicated how indifferent the high court's majority was to voters who might find the photo-ID requirement difficult. He said that it wasn't ''very far'' for a voter who had to travel 17 miles by bus to get government-issued photo-ID.
That the court would restrict voter access to the polls by requiring a state-issued picture ID when valid photo IDs are available from so many other sources -- employers, schools, unions, social organizations, etc. -- exposes the court as insensitive to voting rights or, worse, blind to legal precedent and the lessons of history.
