Tennessee’s Republican-dominated Legislature was not acting alone this year when it pushed through a law requiring voters to produce government-issued photo identity cards, mainly a driver’s license, in order to vote. More than a dozen other states with reinforced Republican-majority legislatures also adopted voter photo-ID requirements, along with other restrictions on voting rights – including new limits on early voting, student residency requirements and stricter rules on provisional voting.
The reason is patently clear. Republicans want to limit voting by possible Democrats in coming elections. The easiest way to do that is to put new restrictions on the right to vote that will affect those who are most likely to be Democrats. Before the 2010 elections, just three states required voter photo IDs; now that number has more than quadrupled.
In most cases, this is patently wrong and morally objectionable, if not unconstitutional. In fact, Tennessee’s law, which is among the harshest, probably is unconstitutional.
Tennessee Attorney General Bob Cooper warned about the legislation’s crucial flaw in a legal opinion issued several months ago. He specifically pointed out – as this page also emphasized to Gov. Bill Haslam months ago when he visited here before the House passed the bill – that the Tennessee legislation is more flawed than similar laws in some other states because it makes no provision for citizens to obtain a free and easily available government photo ID. Courts would probably interpret that as a “poll tax” that “unduly burdens” those who cannot obtain a driver’s license, Cooper warned.
The attorney general said the legislation appeared to violate the U.S. Constitution’s 24th Amendment with respect to federal elections and the Equal Protection Clause with regard to state and local elections. State courts, he said, also would likely find it violated the Tennessee Constitution, which confers protections similar to the Equal Protection Clause.