Voting Rights

Counting down to an election day expected to draw a record-shattering turnout, voting-rights watchdogs are sounding the alarm that a repeat of the Florida fiasco of 2000 could occur in any of a dozen battleground states. Lawsuits are already flying in many of these states.

The state must not throw registered voters off the rolls, even if their voter ID cards were returned as undeliverable, the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled. With the election just days away, the court refused to stop an injunction ordered by a federal judge in Detroit. The case involves 5,500 people who have registered since January 2006, just a fraction of the state's 7.47 million voters.

A sharply divided federal appeals court in Chicago upheld an Indiana law Thursday that requires individuals to produce a government-issued photo identification card to vote. The court rejected a challenge filed by Democrats and handicapped and homeless people that the statute places an unfair burden on voters. The 2-1 decision by the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals is the first ruling by a federal appeals court upholding a statute requiring voters to show photo ID.

Legislation to give the District of Columbia a full vote in the U.S. House stalled Thursday when Republicans unexpectedly injected the volatile issue of gun control. Apparently fearful they might lose control of the proceedings, Democrats decided to put off action indefinitely on the voting rights measure, which had appeared to be moving toward passage. Republicans protested the delay and sought a quick vote on their attempt to repeal the capital city's ban on handguns.

The House approved a bill Thursday giving the District of Columbia its first voting U.S. representative, a step hailed as a moral victory and denounced as a constitutional travesty. Race and disenfranchisement permeated the unusually feisty debate, with lawmakers snapping at each other on the floor.

Two years ago, in a speech at the Justice Department marking the 40th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Bradley J. Schlozman, then the acting chief of the department's civil rights division, found much to celebrate. "The voting enforcement efforts of the civil rights division during this administration have been as strong, if not stronger, than ever," Schlozman declared. "We have a tremendous record, one that is a testament to the division's outstanding attorneys and staff."

Felons who serve their full prison terms must pay their court-ordered fines before regaining the right to vote, a divided state Supreme Court ruled Thursday in a case watched by voting rights advocates. Three ex-convicts claimed Washington's felon-voting restrictions unconstitutionally denied voting rights based on a person's wealth, and a King County court had agreed.

ON MONDAY, a three-judge panel of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia is scheduled to hear arguments in Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District No. 1 vs. Alberto R. Gonzales. It sounds like a ho-hum case, but a great deal is riding on this lawsuit. The outcome could decide the constitutionality of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act and open the way to ending racial gerrymandering and other political distortions that no longer make good sense or good policy.

A drive to give the more than half-million residents of the District of Columbia a vote in Congress came up short in the Senate on Tuesday. It fell three votes shy of the 60 needed to overcome a threatened filibuster and begin debate. But the bill garnered more Republican support than it has in 30 years of discussion on the issue. Its backers pledged to try again -- if not in this session, then in a new Congress in which Democratic gains could spell the difference. "I feel strongly about D.C.