- Originally published in The Washington Post September 23, 2004
Copyright 2004 The Washington Post
By Darryl Fears, Washington Post Staff Writer
The Sentencing Project released a
study yesterday showing that about 14 percent of black men in Atlanta
cannot vote because they are in prison, on probation or on parole.
A
study of Providence by the Rhode Island Family Life Center, released
simultaneously with the Atlanta report, had similar findings. That
study showed that 32 percent of black men from ages 18 to 34 could not
vote, compared with 3 percent of white men and 10 percent of Hispanics.
The
Georgia findings are important, said Ryan S. King, a co-author of the
study, because the laws barring felons from voting "are representative
of a number of other states. . . . We do believe the trend we see in
Atlanta neighborhoods is representative of trends we would see across
the country."
Black men
in Atlanta were 11 times more likely than nonblack men to be
disenfranchised, the study showed. In 11 of the city's neighborhoods,
more than 10 percent of 11,689 black males were disenfranchised. Less
than 2 percent of nonblack males are not allowed to vote in the city,
compared with 14 percent of black males.
In
this campaign season, where the race for president is being hotly
contested and the vote is expected to be razor close, depriving
prisoners and those on parole of the right to vote has become a key
issue. An estimated 5 million Americans are affected by felony voting
restrictions. Black males account for about 8 percent of the U.S.
population and 40 percent of the prison population, studies show.
King and others, mainly Democrats, have said the disproportionately
high incarceration rates of African Americans, coupled with the
revocation of voting rights of felons, casts a pall on voting.
"Disenfranchisement
goes beyond the people affected," King said. "It radiates throughout
the community. In these neighborhoods where a significant number is
restricted from voting, it affects even those who can vote, because
their political voice is being diluted."
Republicans
have countered that activists hoping to restore voting rights to
ex-convicts are more interested in political gamesmanship than civic
altruism.
Peter N. Kirsanow, a
conservative member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, said "most
state disenfranchisement laws don't have blanket prohibitions against
felon voting."
Writing for the National
Review, he said, the aim of groups such as the Sentencing Project "is
nothing less than the wholesale restoration of voting rights to all
convicts -- and that suggests an agenda that's more partisan that
altruistic."
Voter disenfranchisement is
as old as the Constitution. But historians say its enforcement
intensified after Reconstruction, when former slaves asserted their
right to vote.
"In the 20th century,
criminal disenfranchisement became more baldfaced," said Jessie Allen,
an associate counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York
University. "You found deliberate felony disenfranchisement, such as a
1901 constitution in Alabama that selectively disenfranchised African
Americans for crimes they were supposedly prone to commit."
Florida,
which decided the 2000 presidential election, bars former convicts from
voting for life, without permission from a clemency board. President
Bush won the state by slightly more than 500 votes; had ex-convicts
been allowed to vote, he likely would have lost, according to studies
showing that felons tend to vote overwhelmingly for Democrats.
Besides
Florida, seven other states including Virginia bar convicts and former
convicts from voting for life if they fail to appeal. Maryland puts
restrictions on certain criminal categories. In the District, felony
convicts can vote after their terms end.
An
additional 33 states deny the right to vote to ex-convicts on parole,
and 48 states place various restrictions on felon voting. Only Maine
and Vermont have no restrictions.