Pennsylvania's Taxation Without Representation

A U.S Appellate Court ruled last week that the restrictive a voter ID law adopted in Texas discriminates against minorities and violates the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

This comes as no surprise to those who view such laws as thinly veiled attempts to thin the ranks of potential Democratic-leaning voters.

The law was enacted in the wake of the 2013 U.S. Supreme Court decision "that blocked the voting act’s most potent enforcement tool, federal oversight of election laws in numerous states, including Texas, with histories of racial discrimination," the New York Times reported.

"The Texas ID law is one of the strictest of its kind in the country. It requires voters to bring a government-issued photo ID to the polls. Accepted forms of identification include a driver’s license, a United States passport, a concealed-handgun license and an election identification certificate issued by the State Department of Public Safety," according to the Times.

Only in Texas would a concealed-carry permit allow you to vote, but a library card would not.

It also serves as unfortunate notice that a state once regulated for its racism returned to it immediately once freed from the shackles of government oversight.

This ruling is good news; as was a judge's ruling suspending Pennsylvania's own version of voter ID, a law which boldly solved a problem that does not exist and, at the same time, handily discouraged minorities from voting.

Protesters in Harrisburg speak out against Pennsylvania's Voter ID Law.

Both rulings highlight what seem to be an admission by the Republican Party that with national demographics working against them -- Hispanics will be the majority within the next decade or so -- they are now forced to win elections by restricting voters rather than by winning them over with the inclusiveness of their policies.

In other words, scared of losing in a fair fight, they rig the rules.

Anyway, we're not here to talk about race. Heaven forbid.

But Pennsylvania has another long-standing voter restriction that has nothing to do with race, but is a truly insidious form of discrimination. It works against independent thinkers.

This particular voter discrimination goes largely un-remarked and, arguably has more negative impact on fair representation at the polls than the disreputable voter ID law.

Because Pennsylvania has a "closed primary" system, those who are not part of a registered party cannot vote in the spring primaries.

This is not unique in America and is the result of the argument that those not members of a party should not allowed to help choose its nominees. 

This seemingly rationale argument would be less harmful if not for the fact that most school board races in Pennsylvania get decided in those primary elctions.

This is due to another innocent-sounding rationale, that school board's are "non-partisan."

Those of us who attend school board meetings on a regular basis know this to be a load of horse hockey. 

There are often few places more partisan. The only difference is the partisanship on school boards is not always related to party, but to faction -- property tax hawks versus the "anything for the children" faction.

But as the result of something called "cross-filing," school board candidates are legally allowed to seek BOTH the Republican and Democratic lines on the spring ballot.

(Does anyone else find it fatuous that people not registered as Democrats or Republicans are not allowed to vote for a nominee, but the candidates themselves, can win the nomination, no matter what their party registration, if any?)

Yet another injustice, independent voters can't get one of these cool

stickers during the spring primary election.

Often ignored, these primary elections, which attract the smallest percentage of voters, become the place where school board candidates, who will have sway over the largest part of your tax bill, often win the election out right by taking both ballot lines.

This leaves those who, understandably, cannot stomach the shenanigans of either party, no say in their school board representation.

They are allowed to vote in November, yes; but often the only choice they have is which party line to cast their vote for the only candidates available.

This is not democratic (small "d.")

Worse, it represents the illusion of democracy, made more egregious by the fact that few positions have more power over our pocketbooks, the value of our homes and the future of our children, than that of school board.

Only the state government has the power to change this but, since no powerful school board lobby is lining their re-election pocket, it goes unaddressed.

They're too busy arguing about where we buy our booze, as if any of us cares.

There are two easy fixes. 

The state government could, like other states, change to an "open primary" system in which registered independent voters could vote in one primary or the other.

But since this could unbalance the hegemony each party has over its ballot line, don't look for a "come to Jesus" moment from any of that pack any time soon.

The easier solution, more likely because it doesn't gore any of Harrisburg's sacred cows, is to stop allowing cross-filing. 

This simple change would mean that come November, registered voters who are not registered Democrats or Republicans would more likely have a choice in who raises their school taxes.

Sadly, it does not solve the problem of too few candidates running for school boards and other local offices, although the rigged primary probably does little to encourage fledgling candidacies.

But at least it removes the structural exclusion of independents on those occasions when an actual contest might take place.

Otherwise, for independent voters, cross-filing is truly taxation without a say in representation.

And I thought we were supposed to be opposed to that here in America.

Why Do Some Deaths Mean More Than Others?

So some people are probably going to get pissed off about this post.

So it goes.

For obvious reasons, I had a front row view of the media's reaction to the bombings at the Boston Marathon.

Three people, so far, were killed as a result of the blast and, at latest count, 264 people were injured.

It was, without question, horrible and, without question, news.

Two days later, a fertilizer plant in the town of West, Texas, exploded, killing 14 people, injuring 200 and leveling dozens of homes.

Props to Mercury Editor Nancy March for giving, at least the initial reporting on that equally tragic occurrence, similar play on The Mercury's front page.

Would that as many other editors had done so.

On Wednesday, April 24, halfway around the world, 352 workers in a Bangladesh factory building were killed when the eight-story building collapsed around them.

If numbers ruled the world, these latter two events would be much bigger news than the events in Boston.

The lives lost in both these industrial accidents were far and away more than those lost in the bombing in Boston.

The simple truth is, they are not bigger news because of the way they died.

The media, The Mercury included, continues to, and will continue to, cover the details of this admittedly fascinating story in Boston for as long as it sells.

Two brothers, motivated by religious fanaticism, bent on leaving a trail of destruction: To be sure, it's a captivating narrative.

If a TV movie of the week is not already in production, it won't be long before it is.

But what about the deaths in Texas and Bangladesh?

Were those lives less noteworthy?

Will we continue to consume tidbits about the families destroyed by these industrial tragedies with the same morbid enthusiasm and righteous indignation that the Boston tragedy will no doubt continue to capture in our imagination?

I doubt it.

For those of you who don't know, today is Worker's Memorial Day, which, in today's political climate, seems like maybe the only day when this point could be made

You've probably never heard of it. I admit I never had.

According to Wikipedia, Worker's Memorial Day "is an opportunity to highlight the preventable nature of most workplace accidents and ill health and to promote campaigns and union organisation in the fight for improvements in workplace safety."

One phrase in that sentence struck me: "preventable nature of most workplace accidents."

Most workplace accidents are, as it turns out, preventable.

Here in America, we even have an agency, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, whose entire mission is dedicated to the enterprise of keeping us safe at work.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the fatal injury rate for American workers in 2011 — the most recent year for which numbers are available — is 3.5 deaths per 100,000 workers.

That means 4,693 men, women and teenagers died at work in 2011.

"These deaths were largely preventable," says Tom O'Connor, executive director of National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH), an advocacy group formed by organized labor and workers safety advocates, which recently released its own report on workplace fatalities.

"Simply by following proven safety practices and complying with [Occupational Safety and Health Administration] standards, many of these more than 4,600 deaths could have been avoided."

O'Connor blames companies that "decry regulations and emphasize profits over safety."

So thinking about Worker's Memorial Day, I began to wonder, will the owners of the fertilizer plant in Texas be subjected to the same scorn, hatred and internet derision that is already being heaped on the surviving suspect of the attack in Boston?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying Dzhohkar Tsarnaev should be an object of  sympathy, but just think about how many of you recognized that name.

Now, how many of you know the name of the company that owned that fertilizer plant in Texas?

Who are the owners?

Why is a man involved in the death of three people reviled whereas the people who owned a plant that has not had an OSHA inspection since 2006 remain anonymous?

The name of the company is, not surprisingly as it turns out, the West Fertilizer Company.

However, the owners behind that name, remain comfortably unknown and unaccountable to the country at large in a way the Tsarnaev family does not.

This despite the fact that the evidence against those owners is at least as damning as that piling up against Tsarnaev.

"Federal law requires any operation that holds more than a ton of fertilizer-grade ammonium nitrate to report that stock to the Department of Homeland Security. Proposed new rules would cut that to 25 pounds. But Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told a Senate subcommittee Tuesday that West Fertilizer doesn't appear to have reported its ammonium nitrate stock to federal officials," according to CNN.

The plant in West had 270 tons; 269 more tons than the amount required to be reported. 

So why, as a nation, are we outraged about the fact that a pair of brothers who killed three people received Welfare, but remain largely ignorant and comparatively unconcerned about the fact that a company that owned a plant that killed 14 people, violated a federal law and allowed the unsafe condition that caused those 14 deaths? 

There are probably several reasons.

Americans, these days anyway, view industrial accidents as "things that happen. It's a shame, but what are you gonna do?"

Oh, I don't know, file charges maybe?

And when those deaths are caused by unsafe conditions, and the people who skimmed more profit for themselves by skimping on safety for those who made that profit possible, we shrug our shoulders. 

After all, it's not like they meant to kill those people, their own workers. They just, you know, allowed it to happen....

Terrorism, by contrast, is people setting out with the intent of causing harm, which is what makes it so effective. Terrorism works because we let it work; because the idea that someone is trying to harm us on purpose is more unsettling than the idea that someone will let us come to harm simply because they don't think we're worth protecting.

The entire city of Boston was shut down while a hunt was undertaken for one man, suspected in the death of three people.

Part of an entire town in Texas was decimated by an explosion in which the suspected cause is the negligence of a company dealing in a dangerous substance and the nation (and news media) yawns.

Hell, we wouldn't shut down a Wal-Mart for that. After all, we already KNOW who the owners are and it's not like they're trying to get away -- or feel like they have to.

Was Texas Gov. (and would be president) Rick Perry outraged at the senseless deaths of those workers, more likely caused by negligence and avarice than by terrorist attack?

Well he expressed sympathy with their families, sure. 

Respect for the first-responders? Absolutely.

But outrage? At the owners? Not that I've heard. Nor do I expect to.

Here is his statement on his web site in which he "honors the victims" of the West explosion.

He hardly mentions the workers killed at all, instead walking safely in the standard limelight of thanking those who risk their lives every day to save others. 

(Unlike the workers at the fertilizer plant who, as it turns out, risked their lives every day to make fertilizer.) 

I challenge you to find any promise in Perry's statement that he will "bring the perpetrators of this tragedy to justice." You'll be looking for a long time.

But when a California newspaper cartoon suggested this tragedy might be the result of the low level of regulation in his state -- something he brags about on the campaign trail -- well, then, suddenly he's outraged!

The cartoon in The Sacramento Bee shows the Texas governor crowing "Business is Booming" and flanked by signs saying, "Low Tax" "Low Regs!" The next panel reads "Boom!" as an explosion engulfs the area behind the governor.

In a letter to the Bee's editor Friday, Perry says he wouldn't stand for "someone mocking this tragedy." He demanded an immediate apology for the newspaper's "detestable attempt at satire," according to CBS News.

Hello? Its you they're mocking governor and the tragedy that some of our leaders think you can gut safety regulations, and other regulations as well, and suffer no consequence.

Of course he cuts the regulations but its the workers who suffer the consequences.

He's SHOCKED to hear someone suggest that more safety regulations might have saved lives. Outrageous!

What does he think regulations are? Why does he think they were enacted in the first place? 

Have our government officials become so detached from the consequences of their actions that they really see every vote as just a chess-piece on the reelection game board?

Congress, through shameless inaction, let the sequester budget cuts unfold and then expressed shock, SHOCK I TELL YOU, that it affected air traffic controllers. 

Who knew such vital employees were also government employees?

"Well, heck, they have a vital job," said a Congress suddenly moved to act when they held their airline tickets for yet another vacation in their sweaty hands. 

"We better fix this," they said as they rushed out of town.

"Turns out, we need those air traffic controllers. I mean it's not like they're OSHA inspectors or anything ... you know, or teachers."

There was a time when such "avoidable accidents" spurred at least as much outrage among the general public as terrorist attacks.

My friend Sherry Kane works hard to remind people of the horrors of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, which occurred in 1911 and  saw 146 mostly Jewish and Italian immigrants, many women and children, killed when fire broke out in a New York City factory where the doors were locked.

Outrage then was as least as loud as four years later when the a German submarine sank the Lusitania, and the shirtwaist factory fire sparked a movement to improve labor safety whose heritage forms the foundation of OSHA.

But the regulations OSHA attempts to enforce (let's see how THEY fare under the sequester) are now held up as the enemy to progress, not a safety net for workers.

And we in the news media, well we know a story about lax OSHA regulations will generate about as much viewership as re-runs of George W. Bush campaign speeches.

Now, if that factory had been blown up by terrorists on the other hand, well THAT would be something.

Then we would have watched breathlessly as noble law enforcement (public servants all) worked to bring to justice those bastards who killed 14 innocent Americans.

Will we be as eager, I wonder, to follow the story of efforts by the Justice Department (also full of public servants) to bring to justice the owners of that plant who are responsible for the death of 14 innocent Americans?

Please.

Texas and Pennsylvania: Separated at Birth?

Ooops. Texas Voter ID Law tossed by federal court. (Oops belongs to
Reuters, which reported the above in error.)

UPDATE AND CORRECTION:
It turns out I'm not the only one who makes mistakes. 

Apparently Reuters reported the striking down of the voter ID law in Texas in error. 

So that kind of makes half my point in this blog based on an error. So feel free to ignore the first three paragraphs below and find what meaning you can from what remains.

This just in from Reuters:

They could be electoral twins!

"Federal court ruled on Tuesday that a controversial Texas voter identification law discriminates against black and Hispanic voters, effectively killing the law before it could take effect for the Nov. 6 presidential election.

The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued the ruling.

The state law, passed by the Republican-dominated Texas Legislature in 2011, required voters to present one of six forms of photo identification before casting ballots.

In March, the Obama administration blocked the requirement using the 1965 Voting Rights Act, a federal law designed to protect the voting rights of minorities, primarily blacks in Southern states."

Maybe the Pennsylvania Supreme Court will recognize this as a precedent and also throw out our new voter ID law.

Then again, maybe pigs will fly.

The same day Reuters reported the demise of the Texas voter ID law, Associated Press reported that a federal court found that the new legislative districts drawn up by the same legislature had the same problem -- discriminating against minorities.

A few excerpts:

In some cases, black congressional members in Texas had economic drivers such as sporting arenas freshly carved out of their districts, though "no such surgery" was performed on any belonging to white incumbents, according to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

 "Anglo district boundaries were redrawn to include particular country clubs and, in one case, the school belonging to the incumbent's grandchildren," said U.S. Circuit Judge Thomas Griffith, writing the 154-page opinion for the three-judge panel.

Known as seeking "preclearance," Texas and eight other, predominantly southern, states with a history of racial bias must submit their political maps to the U.S. Justice Department for compliance. State prosecutors, however, sought preclearance through the federal court in Washington rather than through the Justice Department.

Luis Vera

Opponents said the state's strategy of skirting the Justice Department backfired. Luis Vera, an attorney for the League of United Latin American Citizens, said the ruling was "better late than never" and an unequivocal win for his and other minority rights groups that sued the state.

How Texas redrew its political boundaries was watched particularly closely after the state was awarded four additional U.S. House seats because of its booming population. The surge has been driven almost entirely by minorities, who account for more than 87 percent of the population growth in Texas over the last 10 years.

So I don't know about you, but a population surge driven almost entirely by minorities should probably not end up short-changing the very people who gave you four more Congressional seats.

Here's my favorite part, the defense Texas chose was this: "We're not discriminating against minorities, we're just trying to get some partisan advantage for the majority party."

This is how AP put it:

The state's lawyers said the map crafted by the Legislature reflected a GOP majority seeking to squeeze a partisan advantage out of the once-a-decade redistricting process, not a willful disregard for the Voting Rights Act. The state also maintained that lawmakers kept a cool distance from the process, leaving much of the work of drawing districts to legislative staff.

The judges were a wee bit dubious.

The state also argued it was only a "coincidence" that district offices and economic drivers were removed from minority districts and not those belonging to white incumbents, according to the court opinion.

"But if this was coincidence, it was a striking one indeed," the ruling said. "It is difficult to believe that pure chance would lead to such results."

So does any of this sound disturbingly familiar?

Photo voter ID laws, insane legislative districts? Heck, Texas could be Pennsylvania.

As I wrote about back in January, the Congressional districts created by the Republican majority somehow passed muster while equally ludicrous state legislative districts -- including one that split Pottstown among three representatives -- was rejected by the courts.

It's a shame, sadly, that making crazy districts, including one that looks like Bullwinkle J. Moose, is legal as long as its only for unfair political advantage.

But maybe, it we keep along the same path, Pennsylvania can soon also be under the eye of the U.S. Justice Dept. as we develop a "history of racial bias."

Won't that be a proud moment for the Keystone state?

Voter ID Law is a Solution in Search of a Problem

So for the moment, and only for the moment, let's set aside the politics.

Let's say the real reason for the Republican Pennsylvania State Legislature and Gov. Corbett to enact a voter ID law is to prevent fraud.

At least that was the reason they gave.

It must be pretty bad.

I'd like to have a look. Can anyone show me where it is? Where did it happen in large numbers? Where is this problem we're solving?

The most recent answer to that question came under President George W. Bush, when the U.S. Justice Department conducted a five-year probe of voter fraud, ending in 2007.

"These laws are the new Jim Crow laws of our times.”
—Maryland Sen. Ben Cardin (D)

Their net?  Eighty six convictions.

Meanwhile, a recent Associated Press reports that 758,939 registered Pennsylvania voters do not have the most easily obtained and widely used photo ID, a state driver's license and so, may be unable to vote.

In Montgomery County, it is estimated that almost 45,000 voters do not have identification that meets the law’s requirement.

When debating the measure, Republicans in Harrisburg assured worried voters that the law would hardly affect anybody who is already registered.

Truly, voter fraud is a mouse of a problem which the GOP is
solving with the legislative equivalent of an atomic bomb.

But the Associated Press report indicates the law could disenfranchise 9.2 percent of the electorate.

Even if you assume all 86 convictions came from Pennsylvania (they didn't) that's a new-problem-created-to-old-non-problem-resolved ratio of 8,824.872093023256 to 1.

Even by Harrisburg math standards, that seems a bit inefficient; unless of course you don't see disenfranchising more than three-quarters of a million registered voters from exercising their civil rights as a problem.

Oddly, real problems in Pennsylvania can't seem to get the time of day in the Legislature.

Consider our lopsided property tax system, or our crumbing infrastructure -- problems which the Pennsylvania Legislature's constituents actually want them to solve. They remain, as they have for decades, languishing in legislative lala land while the GOP rushes to solve a problem whose existence cannot be demonstrated.

A protestor makes his case.

Hmm, so if there really isn't a problem, what other reason could there be to pass such a law?

Prepare yourselves, gentle reader, but the answer might just be ... Dare I say it? Dare we think it? ... yup, politics. More specifically, presidential politics.

Despite the fact that Pennsylvania has not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since 1992, passing a law that makes it harder for people without cars (poor), who live in cities (blacks) to cast their vote might finally accomplish by fiat what they could not accomplish fair and square.

Gov. Tom Corbett signs one of the nation's the
strictest Voter ID bills into law.

Can't convince enough people your man is the man? Just eliminate the people you can't convince from casting a vote in the first place. Simple right?

Pardon my cynicism, but it found great foundation when Mike Turzai, the majority leader of the House of Representatives in Harrisburg opened his mouth and removed all doubt.

Mike Turzai let the cat
out of  the bag. Ooops.

Speaking to a friendly crowd recently, Turzai began ticking off a list of the year's accomplishments by the GOP-controlled Legislature and Governor's mansion.

When he got around to the afore-mentioned law, Turzai said: "Voter ID, which is going to allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania – done."

(For those of you who don't have television, Gov. Romney is the de-facto Republican nominee for president.)

If it were just Pennsylvania, it would be pretty bad. But it's worse than pretty bad.

This is part of a nation-wide effort by Republicans to restrict access to the ballot box.


"This year, legislation is pending in 32 states so far," according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

"That includes new voter ID proposals in 14 states, proposals to strengthen existing voter ID laws in ten states, and bills in nine states to amend the new voter ID laws passed in 2011. The governor signed a new voter ID bill on March 14 in Pennsylvania, and the Virginia General Assembly has sent a new voter ID bill to the governor."

The NCSL has rated Pennsylvania's new law as one of the strictest.

According to National Public Radio, 11 state legislatures over the past two years have enacted some kind of voter ID law. Thirty-one states now require voters to show identification at the polls.

Although this kid may have a student ID, it would not allow
access to the voting booth if the Texas Legislature has its way.
Luckily, it's a gun license, so vote away junior.

And in Texas, where right-wing extremism goes when it needs a hug, the new law now being challenged would not allow Social Security, Medicaid, or student ID cards as adequate identification to exercise your rights.

However, as might be expected from the state that calls the Constitution "the law that lets us carry guns and all that other stuff," gun licenses are enough identification to identify you as someone the Texas Legislature wants in the voting booth.

Now I would be remiss if I did not make mention of an Associated Press story in yesterday's Mercury which highlighted voter registration forms sent by a non-profit, non-partisan organization to people who had died, or for pets, some of whom had also died.

The group, once called Women's Voices: Women Vote and now going by the inexcusable name of Voter Participation Center, says it is trying to increase participation among minorities, unmarried women and people under the age of 30 -- all people who should obviously be denied the right to vote.

In this photo taken Wednesday, July 11, 2012, Brenda Charlston
holds a photo of her long-deceased dog, Rosie, and a voter registration
form for 'Rosie Charlston' that arrived in the mail for the canine
last month, in Seattle. Rosie was a black lab who died in 1998.
I'm not sure of how Rosie would have voted, but I'll bet you she
would never have left any hanging chads.

This undeniably hilarious incident, no doubt, serves as fodder for those who say such "fraud" is rampant and tout photo ID laws as a way to keep those improperly registered, from voting fraudulently.

But again, while the anecdote is alluring and a great newspaper story, the numbers behind it are small.

Katie Blinn, a co-director of elections in Washington state, told AP they have heard about a “handful” of pet-related forms in the state of the past few weeks. Once again, it proposes solving an ant-sized issue with a bazooka.

Personally, I have enough faith in the judgment of the nation's poll workers -- true patriots who work for pennies to ensure the functioning of our democracy's single most critical function --  to believe they would deny poll access to a corpse or "Scampers" the dog, who was apparently offered the chance to register in Virginia.

Just like you can avoid ID requirements to buy cigarettes,
most voter fraud happens with absentee ballots, which
ID laws do not address.

A conservative friend of mine (yes, I have them) who likes to debate these things with me on Facebook raised what I thought was a pretty valid point.

He said something like, you have to show ID to get Welfare payments, and Medicaid, cash a check or buy cigarettes or liquor. Why not voting?"

My response is that those things are benefits that involve public money, or privileges not enshrined in the Constitution. You should have to prove you are the person who is supposed to get that benefit and buying booze is not a right, just a pleasant privilege.

Voting is a civil right right folks, not a political strategy.

Do you need to show an ID to be speak in a public place, or publish a newspaper?

Do you need to show an ID before you can exercise your right not to be discriminated against? (Hmm, OK bad example because, ironically, with these laws in place the answer to that is "yes.")

Eugene Robinson

And yes, you do mostly need to show an ID to buy a gun, but, to my knowledge, no one has ever used a ballot to kill someone, so we'll chalk that one up to common sense.

I couldn't improve on columnist Eugene Robinson's comment on the situation, so I'll just reproduce it here: "Not one case (in the Bush-era investigation) involved the only kind of fraud that voter ID could theoretically prevent: impersonation of a registered voter by someone else. Pennsylvania and other voter ID states have, in a sense, passed laws that will be highly effective in eradicating unicorns.

So let's call a political hack job a political hack job and move on.

The law will, in all likelihood, be in place in November so the best thing to do is learn how to deal with it.

And that is what a non-partisan meeting July 26 is designed to do.

Ellen Kaplan of the Committe

It will be held at the Science Center auditorium at the Montgomery County Community College in Blue Bell at 7 p.m.

The meeting will be facilitated by Ellen Kaplan, vice president and policy director of the Committee of Seventy, a non-partisan voter watchdog group.

“There is a great deal of confusion and concern about the new Voter I.D. law,” said Montgomery County Commissioners vice-Chairman Leslie Richards, who is also chairman of the Montgomery County Election Board.

“And this meeting is one of several steps we are taking to help ensure that the law, if upheld in court, does not prevent anyone who wants to vote from doing so.”

Richards said that while there are strong feelings in favor of and against the new law, the purpose of this meeting is not to provide a venue for people to “trumpet its benefits or vent their displeasure,” but rather to hold a “constructive, informative and helpful meeting where voters can objectively learn about the provisions of the law, and how to obtain the forms of identification the law requires. Of course, if issues or problems with the law’s implementation are overlooked, we would certainly encourage members of the audience to bring that to our attention.”

Richards said that the county has created a “working group” of individuals from various constituencies with a wide range of talents, who are working diligently to identify issues with the new law and to “seek ways to make sure that everyone who wants to vote can.”

It should not take a college course to figure out how to vote. That's the kind of barrier erected by Jim Crow laws.