- Originally published in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution March 16, 2005 Copyright 2005 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
By NANCY BADERTSCHER, CARLOS CAMPOS
A
top official of the American Civil Liberties Union said Tuesday he
expects voting rights groups to file suit if the General Assembly
passes legislation requiring voters to show photo identification at the
polls.
"There's utterly no justification
for it, and I think there's a good argument to be made that it violates
federal law," said Laughlin McDonald, director of the ACLU's Voting
Rights Project.
Chris Riggall, spokesman
for Democratic Secretary of State Cathy Cox, said Tuesday that passage
of the legislation could give Georgia "the most restrictive voter ID
law in the nation."
Seven states
currently require photo IDs, but Georgia would be the first state not
to allow a fallback plan, such as an affidavit or provisional ballot,
Riggall said.
"And it begs the question,
what problem are we solving?" Riggall said. "Out of the hundreds of
election fraud matters before the Election Board in the last nine
years, we can't recall a single one that involved a person falsely
identifying themselves as another registered voter."
Last
Friday, the Republican-led House and Senate gave preliminary approval
to separate measures --- House Bill 244 and Senate Bill 84 ---
requiring photo IDs that GOP leaders said would cut down on voter
fraud. But the bills sparked a walkout of Democrats from the House and
Senate. They argued the requirement effectively would deny the right to
vote to some minority, poor and elderly voters and would be a throwback
to the days of the poll tax.
Current
Georgia law allows voters to use any one of 17 forms of identification,
including a valid driver's license, military ID, utility bill or a bank
statement. The new bills would require a driver's license, military ID,
student picture ID, U.S. passport, state-issued ID or government
employee ID.
Riggall said Cox worked
closely with the U.S. Justice Department to help draft the state's
current law, which allows voters who have no identification to receive
a provisional ballot after they sign a sworn statement on their
identity.
The bills, both of which are
still pending before the Legislature, continued Tuesday to spark some
of the most bitter rhetoric of the legislative session.
In
the Senate, the highest-ranking Republican, President Pro Tem Eric
Johnson of Savannah, chastised Democrats for their Friday night walkout.
"Nobody
is claiming that senators don't have the right to speak for their
constituents," Johnson said. "But when the language turns to calling
people racists, returning to the white hoods of KKK, wearing
shackles on the floor of the Senate, we crossed the line, we violated
the decorum of this chamber and . . . disrespected every citizen of
this state."
In the House, where some
lawmakers could face sanctions for their protests last week, Rep. David
Lucas (D-Macon) criticized Speaker Glenn Richardson (R-Hiram) for
disseminating a letter on the potential punishments for misconduct. "I
took the letter to mean if I don't do what y'all say, you'll silence
me," Lucas told the House.
Doug Lewis,
director of the nonprofit Elections Center in Houston, said the debate
over photo IDs has "been around a long, long time."
"Whenever it has come up, it's bitter," he said.