Tag Archives: voting

A Thought on Gerrymandering Congressional Districts

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This is triggered by a summary of a case that’s before the Supreme Court in the just-started Court session.

Alabama redistricting: Democrats and black lawmakers contend that Republican leaders in Alabama drew a new legislative map that illegally packed black voters into too few voting districts to limit minority political power. Republicans say they complied with the law by keeping the same number of districts in which black voters could elect candidates of their choice.

This question should be irrelevant today.

Instead, we should have square districts, except where the district abuts a state border (perhaps, also, where a small part of a district would be on the other side of a natural barrier, like a river, with no nearby path across/around the barrier). Political districts should be drawn without regard to the population encompassed.

There should be no special treatment for one group of Americans over another; this accomplishes nothing beyond harming the groups denied the same special treatment. There should be no differential treatment under law for one group of Americans compared to any other; this accomplishes nothing beyond harming the groups denied that same differential treatment. The 14th Amendment makes this clear, as if it’s not morally so, already.

Especially, there should be no special political district shapes carved to accommodate, or to disaccommodate, one group or another. We each have one vote, of equal value to each other vote, regardless of our skin color or ethnicity. We are, after all, each equal to another before God and law. We are, after all, each of us Americans; in this this political, legal, religious context, there are no relevant distinctions among us. Full stop.

As a Supreme Court Justice already has recognized, the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.

Restricting Voters?

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Ex-President Bill Clinton and the AP are at it again, this time from the venue of the Civil Rights Summit at the Lyndon B Johnson Presidential Library in Austin.

Former President Bill Clinton is using the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act to criticize efforts in several states to create new restrictions for voters, saying they threaten to roll back a half-century of progress.

Clinton and the AP, on the occasion of this auspicious anniversary, are beefing about the Supreme Court’s ruling releasing a number of states that had a history of discriminatory voting laws, now that they have accumulated a substantial and substantive history of non-discrimination, from the Federal bondage of having to plead “Mother, may I?” from the Feds before they could update any of their election procedures.  The two also are beefing about the increasing number of voter ID laws.

Of course, this is just Progressive nonsense.  The efforts “in several states” are to increase restrictions on ineligible voters, for the protection of voters.  The only “roll back” that’s going on is of the progress made in the last 50 years enabling the dead to vote, enabling non-citizens to vote, enabling “voters” to vote multiple times and in multiple districts during the same election.

Another Federal Judge

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…gets it right.  US District Judge Eric Melgren has ruled that Kansas and Arizona can, indeed, require proof of citizenship as a criterion for registering to vote in Federal elections: American elections are for American citizens only.  The second clause of the 14th Amendment is pretty clear on this.

Melgren ruled, in part,

Because the Court finds that Congress has not preempted state laws requiring proof of citizenship through the National Voter Registration Act, the Court finds the decision of the EAC denying the states’ requests to be unlawful and in excess of its statutory authority.  Since the Court’s decision turns on the plain statutory language, the Court need not resolve the question of whether the Constitution permits the EAC, or Congress, to disregard the states’ own determination of what they require to satisfactorily determine citizenship.

As the Kansas City Star pointed out,

Nationally, voting rights experts contend that the court’s ruling—if it survives on near-certain appeals—could open the door for more states to enact laws requiring voters to produce documents proving their citizenship.

One can certainly hope so.  Like I said: American elections are for American citizens only.

Melgren also noted

The Constitution gives each state exclusive authority to determine the qualifications of voters for state and federal elections.  Article I, section 2, clause 1—often called the Qualifications Clause—provides that the voters for the US House of Representatives in each state shall have the same qualifications required for voters of the largest branch of the state legislature.  The Seventeenth Amendment adopts the same requirement for voters for the US Senate.  The US Supreme Court has read these provisions to conclude that the states, not Congress, set the voter qualifications for federal elections.

Melgren went on to note that the same Clause also grants Congress the power to overrule the States’ rules statutorily—and that the Congress has not done so.  We can look forward to further Democratic Party efforts to sully our elections by attempting to get Congress to force the States to accept anyone as voter, citizen or not.

Melgren’s ruling can be read here.

Immigration and Voting

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The central thesis of this post is a brief excerpt from Daniel Hannan’s (MEP) book, Inventing Freedom: How the English-Speaking Peoples Made The Modern World.

[I]n the 2010 Canadian election, immigrants were more likely to vote Conservative than native Canadians.  Think, for a moment, how exceptional such an outcome is.  In most of the world, newcomers vote overwhelmingly for left-of-center parties.  There are plenty of reasons why.  They are usually penniless when they arrive, and so gravitate to politicians who purport to represent the poor.  They tend to live in districts represented by leftist politicians who, at local level, are the first to help them navigate the political system of their new nation.  And, of course, left-wing parties see themselves as champions of all minorities.

The success of the Canadian Conservatives owed a great deal to their determined campaigning among ethnic minorities and new settlers.  But it was assisted by the non-racial way in which English-speaking societies define themselves. [pg 280]

This shouldn’t be surprising to any of us.  Immigrants come to the US, and to Canada, looking to make better lives for themselves and their families than was possible in their old country.  They bring with them a habit of self-reliance and a powerful work ethic.  By their immigration, they’ve shown themselves to be willing to take risks for gain and not simply to wait on handouts.  Immigrants are more likely to start (and succeed with) small businesses, too, and small businesses are the jobs generators of our economy.  These are principles of modern Conservatism in the US; we should be welcoming them with open arms.

Republican—and Conservative—candidates also should take heed of that last paragraph in the quote: “determined campaigning among ethnic minorities and new settlers.”  They should do this, not only in their own districts—which must come first, surely, as winning the election is a prerequisite to getting anything done in elective office—but also in their neighboring Democrat districts, where many more immigrants—and native minorities—live; these voters should not be dismissed by us.

It would help, also, if we, as a nation, turned to what has been demonstrated to a large degree in Canada: “the non-racial way in which” we define American society—but in practice as well nominally in law.  The Democrats and Progressives cannot let go of their racial (or gender) difference meme (recall the MSNBC bi-racial Cheerios ad kerfuffle, the cries of racism whenever a white man criticizes a black government official, the squawks of sexism when a man criticizes a woman candidate), but we Republicans and Conservatives surely can move beyond such racism and sexism.  Beginning, as alluded above, with going into immigrant and minority neighborhoods and talking directly with those folks—not as Asian or Mexican immigrants, not at Black- or Hispanic- or Asian-Americans, but as Americans and future Americans.

In the end, we shouldn’t be afraid of how immigrants might vote (we shouldn’t be shutting them out of our country over that question at all).  Immigrants in the United States generally would vote with Republicans and Conservatives, if only we would give them the chance.

Certainly, we need have no fear for the Conservative message in any contest of ideas.

Silencing Critics

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It isn’t enough that the Obama administration, and Democrats generally, are so terrified at the Conservative message that the President sicced his IRS on Conservative political entities in an effort to suppress their political speech as it was expressed as financial support for Conservative and Republican candidates in the 2012 elections.

Now they’re attempting to codify that suppression with a new Treasury rule for the IRS regarding what Democrats will permit 501(c)(4) entities to do in the coming elections.

Here is what a 501(c)(4) entity is, according to the Legal Information Institute:

(A) Civic leagues or organizations not organized for profit but operated exclusively for the promotion of social welfare, or local associations of employees, the membership of which is limited to the employees of a designated person or persons in a particular municipality, and the net earnings of which are devoted exclusively to charitable, educational, or recreational purposes.

(B) Subparagraph (A) shall not apply to an entity unless no part of the net earnings of such entity inures to the benefit of any private shareholder or individual.

It’s that educational part that’s important: educating the public about political matters and about where politicians stand on those matters is, well, educational.  It’s just that overt political activity can’t be the predominant activity of a (c)(4) entity.  This is one of the outcomes of the Supremes’ 2010 Citizens United decision regarding the unconstitutional ban of a Hillary Clinton documentary in the runup to the 2008 Democratic Party primaries.

Here are excerpts from Treasury’s new proposed rule for executing that suppression:

1.  Communications

Communications that are made within 60 days of a general election (or within 30 days of a primary election) and clearly identify a candidate or political party.
…
3.  Activities Closely Related to Elections or Candidates

Holding an event within 60 days of a general election (or within 30 days of a primary election) at which a candidate appears as part of the program.
…
Treasury and the IRS are planning to issue additional guidance…public focus regarding the proportion of a section 501(c)(4) organization’s activities that must promote social welfare.  Due to the importance of this aspect of the regulation, the proposed guidance requests initial comments on this issue.

This timing of activities, also, was addressed by the Supremes in Citizens United.  Moreover, Treasury is moving to keep their follow-on rule regarding proportionality under the radar until after the 2014 elections, thus leaving the claimed ambiguity in place for further 2012-style IRS suppression of Conservative entities.

Clearly, Treasury is intent on facilitating the IRS’ ability to harass and to outright silence government-disapproved organizations—especially those impertinent enough to disagree with the administration.

All of this is in an election year, no less.

The full text of Treasury’s announcement concerning the rule can be seen via The Washington Post.