Current
Republican Sec. of State Tom Schedler
looks to keep the job after scraping by four years ago. Then, he faced outgoing
House Speaker Jim Tucker, whose position gave the term-limited legislator
extensive political capital and produced the most competitive race of that
cycle. This time, none of his opponents have quite the resources Tucker brought
to the challenge, but Schedler’s main competitor relies upon hawking a change
in voter registration laws to convince the electorate to replace him.
Law
professor Chris Tyson, a Democrat from a politically-connected family and
environment who worked for former Sen. Mary Landrieu, criticizes Schedler mainly
on two counts. First, he alleges that Schedler wastes funds on a lawsuit
brought by the federal government, now four years in the running. Also, he
argues that Louisiana ought to adopt same day voter registration, saying it
would boost turnout as opposed to the current 30-day residency period required,
claiming the state has high registration levels but relatively low turnout. He
asserts that Schedler has resisted this change out of concerns of fraud Tyson
dismisses.
Yet
Tyson seems entirely unaware of the inconsistency attached to his two central
claims. In the case
of the suit, which he says Schedler should just settle as other states
have, the Pres. Barack
Obama Administration had launched an ideological crusade to bully states
into registering more voters through threats and intimidation like the suit.
The strategy is built on the supposition that constituencies favorable to
Democrats disproportionately do not register to vote, and that the state should
spend more time and money to push registration to this population, courtesy of
a federal law that mandates that state agencies that largely deal with the
public provide registration opportunities.
Schedler,
in defending agianst the federal Department of Justice, rightly notes there is
no causal connection showing the state deliberately obstructs the process and
would rather fight the injustice of the request instead of caving in as Tyson
suggests. Although Tyson’s expertise lies in property law, not election law,
it’s not commendable as a model to the future lawyers he teaches to advocate
settling in court instead of resisting government when it is wrong.
And,
this position where he agrees that the state registers too few people is
distinctly at odds with his claim that he state registers enough but too few
vote, the basis of his argument for same day registration. His cavalier view
that this change, which in the dozen or so states that practice it typically
entails registering at the polling place often but not always involving a
government identification card such as a driver’s license, poses no threat to
election integrity is shockingly ignorant.
The
sad fact is these election
irregularities are far more common than widely known, with same day
registration providing a convenient gateway to foster fraud that led to an
estimated over 6 percent of ballots fraudulently cast by noncitizens in 2008
and over 2 percent in 2010. State laws which allow for some time between
registration and election get removed with being able to do both on the same
day, creating avenues for corrupting elections.
For
example, while not easy, Louisiana’s laws make it possible for illegal
registration. Louisiana
law does not unambiguously require government-issued identification to be
able to vote, nor
does registration. Were these to be tightened, such as in needing
unambiguous presentation of government-issued identification, that still is not
an insurmountable hurdle to overcome. For example, the right combination of
secondary documents, none of which would disqualify aliens, scores
a driver’s license in Louisiana. Perhaps even more easily, the process of
obtaining one by holding a valid license from another state requires no
citizenship check, which includes licenses from the several states that do not
check for citizenship from their applicants.
Tyson
seems blissfully unaware of these possibilities, so at best his views on this
subject are negligent. Nor does he even understand that this is a solution in
search of a problem; when he supposes that Louisiana’s voting rates are too
low, that indicates he is not informed on research on voting participation that
shows, when holding constant the factors affecting voting turnout, that Louisiana
actually has one of the highest turnout rates among the states.
This
overall cluelessness disqualifies him from serious consideration for the job,
as he conducts a campaign apparently long on ideology but short on facts.
Still, to pretend to remain a significant force in statewide politics,
Louisiana Democrats need to compete wherever possible, and it appears Tyson
drew the straw here.
Even
one fraudulent ballot can corrupt an entire election, and government must
maximize efforts to ensure total honesty in elections. In the case of Tyson,
voters should look elsewhere for a candidate for this office that does not so
indifferently understands its role in maintaining elections integrity.
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