National Voter I.D. Cards: A "Remedy in Search of a Problem"
Feature Story by civilrights.org staff - 7/14/2005
The disenfranchisement of many eligible voters is just one of the risks posed by voter identification requirements, a coalition of civil and voting rights organizations told the bipartisan Commission on Federal Election Reform on June 29.The 21-member commission - dubbed the Carter-Baker Commission for its chairmen, former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James A. Baker III - met June 29 at Rice University to look at voting problems and make recommendations to Congress on how to improve the electoral process.
Voter I.D. cards have been proposed by several groups and campaigns in recent years as a way to deal with alleged voter fraud.
The twenty-six co-signers of a June 29 statement opposing a national voter identification system - including the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR), the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and People For the American Way - argued that a system of voter I.D. cards will create new barriers to voting and will undermine provisions of the Voting Rights Act and the Help America Vote Act of 2002.
The groups say that new voter identification requirements, including national voter I.D. cards or proof of identity such as birth certificates, driver's licenses and state-issued identification cards, place undue burden on voters. They contend that such requirements will suppress voting among specific populations such as seniors, the poor, racial, ethnic and language minorities, people with disabilities, and urban residents -- many of whom are less likely to own motor vehicles and possess a driver's license.
The 2001 National Commission on Election Reform, which studied problems occurring during the 2000 election, found that I.D. requirements at polls are selectively enforced, and that poll workers are more likely to ask minority voters to prove their identity while allowing white voters to vote without providing identification.
Although proponents of a national voter I.D. card claim that such a system will help curb voter fraud, LCCR and other groups point out that the evidence of widespread voter fraud is hearsay and anecdotal at best.
Efforts to implement and regulate similar programs on the state level have met with resistance. Most notably, new proposals to comply with the voter identification requirements of Arizona's Proposition 200 have drawn fire from many state election officials.
While acknowledging that reforms need to be made in the wake of the 2000 and 2004 elections, the coalition of civil and voter rights groups see a national system of voter I.D. cards as "a remedy in search of a problem that could deny millions of eligible voters their right to vote."
The Commission will meet privately in August to draft a report and recommendations, scheduled for a September release.
