While generally the comments made by former New Orleans Mayor Marc
Morial at his party’s national convention have no basis in reality, they
illustrate why tighter voting registration requirements are vital to the health
of American representative democracy, including in Louisiana.
Morial, who now heads the National
Urban League, opined to Democrats that laws requiring certain, positive
identification of potential voters were a plot by wild-eyed racists, presumably
not Democrats, to bring back “the old Jim Crow.” Then in expressing approval of
laws that allow for loopholes, he firmly came down in the camp of those who
would subvert democracy because anything but laws mandating strict
identification measures with government-supplied, if need be free to recipients,
photo identifications cards allow for fraud.
The vanguard states for honesty at the polling place are Indiana and
Georgia, which have these requirements. Even without that identification, one
can vote provisionally but then shortly after the election must produce it for
the vote to count. Other states like Louisiana generally require photo
identification but have exceptions granted that easily may be used to cheat.
R.S. 18:562
governs procedures to voting, requiring the government-issued identity card but
then allowing voting without it under two scenarios. One is by using a “generally recognized picture identification card that
contains the name and signature of the applicant,” which cannot be too
difficult to fake, and the other is if
one can answer questions from information
gathered at registration, contained on the voter rolls with election commissioners.
None of it is difficult to obtain, with the only piece beyond easy (such as
address) being mother’s maiden name.
This setup leaves many openings stemming from the law headed straight
to fraud. For example, Louisianans who are attending college in other states
but registered here, instead of voting absentee, are vulnerable, as are those
in nursing homes. The dead if not reported remain on rolls. And the biggest
loophole unique to Louisiana inspired from the 2005 hurricane disasters, still
on the books, are the “displaced” people who remain automatically on the books even
if they have not resided in the state, parish, or precinct since a gubernatorially-declared
disaster.
Extending these examples and assuming in each case no intent to aid in fraudulent
voting, in a family where a student is out of state and does not intend to vote
another member may pass along information to an imposter. Nursing home workers
in cahoots with a party or candidates can get to the needed information to
provide to impersonators, even as simply as asking residents they know who will
not vote in what appears to be normal conversation. Someone whose family member
is displaced and does not intend to vote can slip the needed information to an
impersonator. And these are just the instances where the person being impersonated
has no knowledge of it; easier scenarios can be constructed when that person
actively participates in the scam.
Arguments against tightening requirements to the Indiana/Georgia
standards are that fraud is relatively rare and that to do so creates an unconstitutional
burden (akin
to a poll tax). But to make such argumentation only shows ignorance or
disingenuousness. The U.S. Supreme Court and a lower federal court ruled years
ago such standards did not create an undue unconstitutional burden, and the low
known rate of fraudulently votes cast probably pales in comparison to the
unknown number that do get cast illegally but never are discovered. Regardless,
there is nothing more precious to maintaining the integrity of democracy that
in fairness in voting, so even if superior measures discourage only one additional
illegal ballot, they’re worth it.
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