Election Reform Organizations in Missouri
Call to Action!!!!!
Provisional Ballots
Introduced by federal law in 2002 as part of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), the provisional ballot was designed for voters whose registration was in question. Initially proposed by the Congressional Black Caucus, it was to save the rights of those wrongly purged from voter rolls.
HAVA provisional ballot law allows election officials to give provisional ballots to any persons who:
- show up at the polls on Election Day but find that, for whatever reason, their names are not on the voter rolls; or
- have their right to vote challenged by an election official. (Note: In many locations it’s not just election officials, but also partisan observers who challenge voters).
Unlike regular ballots, provisional ballots are not required under HAVA to be counted. Rather, the decision whether or not to count provisional ballots is determined by the 50 individual Secretaries of State. Across the nation, large numbers of provisional ballots have been systematically rejected. During the 2004 election, a total of 3,107,490 voters were moved into provisional ballots. The number of ballots rejected was a stunning 1,090,729.
ACTION: Check with www.CanIVote.org to see if you are registered. They also need to ensure their ID matches the voter registration name exactly. Voters can be challenged over minor things, such as a middle initial on their ID while the voter roll has a full middle name listed. Next, check to be sure your polling place has not moved.
New Voter Identification Laws
Many states have passed laws that require citizens to provide a photo
identification
piece proving that they are indeed citizens. A driver’s license and a birth
certificate
are inadequate because the former doesn’t prove citizenship and the latter
doesn’t
provide a photo. A passport does qualify. As the state supreme courts
review these new
laws, many have already been struck down as unconstitutional because they
are barriers to voting.
ACTION: All citizens should check with their Secretary of State’s office to
ensure
what the current requirements are. If a photo ID is required, a protest
should be
lodged as to the unconstitutionality of the law.
Missouri Election News
Supreme Court of Missouri
Opinion
Kathleen Weinschenk, et al., Respondents,
v. State of Missouri, Appellant, Robin Carnahan, Secretary of State,
Respondent, Dale Morris and Senator Delbert Scott, Intervenors-Appellants.
Case Number: SC88039
Handdown Date: 10/16/2006
In a per curiam (unsigned) opinion, the Missouri Supreme Court upheld
a lower court opinion invalidating the state's photo ID requirement.
AFFIRMED.
Court en banc holds: (1) The trial court properly held that SB 1014's
photo ID requirement violates the equal protection clause of article I,
section 2 of the state constitution. It also properly held that the photo
ID requirement violates the right to vote as guaranteed by article I,
section 25 of the state constitution, which provides more expansive
and concrete protection to the right to vote than the federal constitution.
In reaching these conclusions, this Court applies strict scrutiny analysis,
in which any limitation on a fundamental right must serve compelling state
interests and must be narrowly tailored to meet those interests. SB 1014's
photo ID requirement fails to pass constitutional scrutiny because it
creates a heavy burden on the fundamental right to vote and is not
narrowly tailored to meet a compelling state interest.
For these reasons, the trial court judgment is affirmed.
The full opinion is available at the
Supreme Court's web page
For a daily update of election news in Missouri go to this link and scroll down to Iowa (news articles listed alphabetically by state).
