Fwd: Amendment would Restrict Voting - for Seniors, the Military, our Neighbors
From: patty (pattypaxearthlink.net)
Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2012 17:21:15 -0700 (PDT)
I hope that this amendment is voted down.  VOTE NO  and pass this to everybody. 
 It is so very very important to all of us.  patty

Begin forwarded message:

> From: <jmarty [at] apple-pie.org>
> Date: August 31, 2012 5:03:06 PM CDT
> To: <pattypax [at] earthlink.net>
> Subject: Amendment would Restrict Voting - for Seniors, the Military, our 
> Neighbors
> 
> 
> 
>  
> Amendment would Restrict Voting - for Seniors, the Military, our Neighbors
> by Senator John Marty
> August 31, 2012       
> Supporters of Minnesota's proposed Constitutional Amendment to restrict 
> voting ask people to ratify it based on an appeal to their narrow self 
> interest. Despite the lack of fraud from voter impersonation, they imply that 
> a voter is "protecting" his or her own vote. But blocking tens of thousands 
> of other Minnesotans from voting because one or two of them might have been 
> fraudulent, is in not protecting one's own vote. 
> 
> Amendment proponents appeal to fear and self-interest, but I want to appeal 
> to Minnesotans' sense of fairness. It is wrong to place roadblocks that make 
> it impossible to vote for the senior in assisted living, the soldier serving 
> in Afghanistan, the disabled woman who is homebound, or the veteran who is 
> homeless. They have a right to vote too. 
> 
> In our democracy, the right to vote is fundamental. Not just for you and me, 
> but for all citizens of our state. Taking away the vote from our neighbors 
> under the pretext of preventing "fraud" is a radical step backwards for that 
> democracy. The constitution is supposed to guarantee human rights, not take 
> them away from others who Republican politicians apparently don't want to 
> vote. 
> 
> This anti-democracy initiative is present in many states, but the proposed 
> amendment in Minnesota is perhaps the worst assault on voters. 
> 
> The recent Minnesota Supreme Court ruling on the amendment shows that if it 
> is ratified, people needing to vote absentee by mail would lose their right 
> to vote. The Court's opinion explicitly said that under the amendment, 
> absentee voters who couldn't hand the election judge the government-issued 
> photo identification, would be required to provide "something that is 
> virtually identical to such identification." There is no way that an election 
> judge can make a "virtually identical" verification, comparing a voter's face 
> to their photo ID, when the election judge is in St. Paul and the absentee 
> voter mails their ballot from a remote outpost in Afghanistan, or from 
> anywhere else. 
> 
> It is not only out-of-town voters disenfranchised by the amendment. The 
> amendment authors tell voters not to worry about the details because they 
> will be worked out later, by the legislature. But we don't need to wait to 
> see the intent. The amendment's authors already showed us their intent in 
> legislation they passed last year, blocked only by the governor's veto. In 
> it, they would give almost no alternative to producing a drivers' license (or 
> the state non-driver ID or a new ID created just for voting) showing the 
> voter's current address, in order to vote. 
> 
> No military IDs would be allowed. No student IDs either. While many voters 
> assume that "everyone" has a drivers license with their current address, that 
> simply isn't reality. And if your wallet is stolen, or you misplace your 
> license in the weeks before an election, you won't be able to vote. 
> 
> Students living away from home in a dorm, who would no longer be able to vote 
> absentee, would need to pay for a driver's license for their new address even 
> if they are only living there for nine months! Virtually no homeless 
> Minnesotan, including the many Vietnam-era veterans who are living on the 
> streets, would be able to vote if this provision is enshrined in our 
> constitution. They risked their lives for our country, but they are not 
> good-enough to vote? 
> 
> And if a senior in assisted living or a nursing home didn't happen to keep 
> their no-longer-needed driver's license, can you envision family members or 
> friends transporting frail, elderly people from the nursing home to the 
> license bureau to get a photo ID, just so they can vote? 
> 
> This amendment isn't preventing fraud. It's preventing seniors in nursing 
> homes from voting. 
> 
> While Republican legislators claim this is about preventing fraud, the only 
> type of fraud that a photo ID requirement might prevent, is when a person 
> tries to vote by impersonating someone else. A national investigative report 
> found only ten cases of voter impersonation in the entire U.S. during the 
> past decade. 
> 
> That's about one preventable voter fraud case in Minnesota every 50 years! 
> For that, taxpayers would spend $32,000,000 in state funds, plus additional 
> city and county costs - just for the first year. And, in the process we would 
> take away the right to vote for tens of thousands of seniors, students, 
> people with disabilities, people whose license was recently lost or stolen, 
> and people who are more pressed with feeding their children than paying for a 
> duplicate birth certificate and other documentation so that they can qualify 
> for a "free" photo ID card for voting. 
> 
> Minnesota has an election system that has relied, successfully, on voters 
> signing an oath that they are eligible to vote, with violators facing a 5 
> year felony penalty. We have consistently had the nation's best voting 
> system, and the highest voter turn-out. This constitutional amendment would 
> destroy that. 
> 
> The real fraud is the claim that this amendment is about fraud prevention. It 
> is a blatant attempt to take away voting rights from countless Minnesota 
> voters. A century after women were given the right to vote and fifty years 
> after African-Americans were given the right to vote, this amendment would 
> move Minnesota backwards. 
> 
> Our democracy depends, not only on your individual right to vote, but also on 
> the individual right of all of your neighbors to vote. It's time for 
> Minnesotans to speak out on behalf of our neighbors and defeat this 
> mean-spirited amendment.
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