Remember: our rules allow pointed disagreement, but require respectful discussion.
--
>When I ran for city council in Madison, Wisconsin in 1967, students
>gained the right to vote in local elections in part because I gave voice
>to an elementary question of civil rights. Before that local moment in
>that city, students were officially transient: vulnerable to the draft
>but not a party to the decisions of the body politic in their vicinity.
>. . .
>Fred Markus, Horn Terrace, Ward Ten
Well, Fred, get ready for that situation again, right here in
Minnesota!
Republican Secretary of State Kiffmeyer has a bill she has presented at the
Legislature, supposedly in response to the votes that were stolen in
Florida. But in fact, her bill would probably result in MORE voters being
turned away at the polls in Minnesota. It would require people to show a
picture ID with their current address in order to be able to vote.
But hidden in this bill is a list of what forms of picture ID would be
acceptable for voting -- and a college student ID is NOT an acceptable
one. So most students would not be able to vote, unless they had changed
the address on their drivers license to their dorm address. (Which most of
them do not do (why? you often move to another dorm room each year) and
even if they did so, it's unlikely that the state would get it back to them
in time for the election (certainly not for the Primary).
And of course, the basic idea of requiring a picture ID with your current
address is most likely to eliminate voters who move often (like renters &
poor people) and who don't want to spend the money ($25 or so, I think) on
getting a new drivers license (again, like poor people). Here in
Minneapolis, some wards, like parts of the 6th, have over 30% of their
registered voters move in a year.
And, of course, all these people that are likely to be turned away at the
polls (students, renters, poor people) all tend to vote more DFL than
Republican. How convenient for Ms. Kiffmeyer
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