The American Democracy Minute Radio Report & Podcast for Oct. 3, 2024

Today’s Script

(Variations occur with audio due to editing for time. Today’s Links below the script)

You’re listening to the American Democracy Minute, keeping YOUR government by and for the people.

Our report on court challenges to undated or misdated mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania mentioned the “Materiality Provision” of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.  Just what is the Materiality Provision, and how can it help protect voters?

In question are ballot envelopes from otherwise eligible voters, received on time and correct except for a missing or incorrect date on the outer envelope.  Pennsylvania’s election law invalidates those ballots, and as many as 10,000 voters were affected in 2022.

The materiality provision, part of the 1964 Civil Rights Act’s Title 1, was designed to keep racist election officials from rejecting voter registrations for minor mistakes – used as a voter suppression tactic throughout the South.  For instance, White voters were given assistance and alerted to mistakes, while Black voters were disenfranchised for a simple spelling error.    

For years, federal courts found that Title 1 applies to the whole voting process, and ruled that missing dates, envelopes, and postmarks are “immaterial” to the validity of the ballot. Only recently have Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito and other Conservative judges argued that it should apply ONLY to registration, and overturned such appeals.  

If a voter does everything else right, but makes a trivial mistake, shouldn’t we make every effort to honor the intent of the voter?  The ACLU’s high court appeal may answer that question.

We’ve linked more at AmericanDemocracyMinute.org.  I’m Brian Beihl.

Today’s Links

Articles & Resources:

Congressional Research Service – The Civil Rights Act of 1964: Eleven Titles at a Glance
Fordham Law Voting Rights and Democracy Forum – Helen L. Brewer – Title I of the Civil Rights Act in Contemporary Voting Rights
Litigation
Protect Democracy – The Constitutionality of the Materiality Provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965
Democracy Docket – Pennsylvania Orgs Ask SCOTUS To Decide if Rejecting Mail-in Ballots for Date Errors Violates Civil Rights Act
Campaign Legal Center – (2018) CLC Argument Used in Georgia Absentee Ballot Cases
Democracy Docket – This Civil Rights Provision Protects Your Vote from Simple Mistakes

Groups Taking Action:

ACLU, NAACP PA , League of Women Voters PA, Black Political Empowerment Project 

Check Your Voter Registration:

• U.S. Election Assistance Commission – Register And Vote in Your State
• USA Vote Foundation – Registration, Eligibility, State Election Office Links
• Vote.Gov – Register to Vote in Your State
• Vote.Org – Check Your Registration to Vote
  
  

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#Democracy  #DemocracyNews #VoterSuppression #CivilRightsAct #Pennsylvania #SCOTUS

The post What is the ‘Materiality Provision’ of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and How Can it Help Protect Voters? appeared first on American Democracy Minute.

The American Democracy Minute Radio Report & Podcast for July 2, 2024

Today’s Script

(Variations occur with audio due to editing for time. Today’s Links below the script)

You’re listening to the American Democracy Minute, keeping YOUR government by and for the people.

The North Carolina Senate endorsed a ballot measure June 25th prohibiting noncitizens from voting – for which there is already existing law. And the Senate declined another measure repealing a racist Jim Crow-era literacy test to vote, still enshrined in the state’s constitution.

There is no evidence that more than a handful of noncitizens have voted in any federal or state elections nationally.  Yet noncitizen voting has been among the loudest accusations in this election cycle.  All 50 states already prohibit noncitizens from voting in state elections, and a 1996 federal law prohibits it in federal elections.  BallotPedia reports that 16 municipalities and the District of Columbia DO allow noncitizen voting in municipal elections only.  

North Carolina would become the fifth state this year to put a measure on the November 2024 ballot. Five other states recently passed similar measures, pushed by former Trump election lawyer Cleta Mitchell.   

The state senate also rejected a measure proposing repeal of a Jim Crow-era literacy test for voting, enshrined in the state constitution since 1899 even after the 1965 Voting Right Act banned such discrimination in voting. 

Sec. 4.

Voter registration requires literacy test and payment of poll taxes. Every person presenting himself for registration shall be able to read and write any section of the Constitution in the English language; and, before he shall be entitled to vote, he shall have paid, on or before the first day of March of the year in which he proposes to vote, his poll tax, as prescribed by law, for the previous year. Poll taxes shall be a lien only on assessed property, and no process shall issue to enforce the collection of the same, except against assessed property.

Suffrage Amendment, 1899, Ratified in 1900

In a 109 – 0 vote, the state  House approved sending the ballot measure to voters to repeal it,  but WRAL reports the senate voted the measure down, with one senator suggesting that the bill was too last minute.  

Read the measures and local reporting linked from AmericanDemocracyMinute.org.  I’m Brian Beihl.

Today’s Links

Articles & Resources:
North Carolina State Constitution – 1899 Suffrage Amendment

Democracy North Carolina – The literacy test was a tool originally used to prevent Black, Brown, and Indigenous North Carolinians from voting.
WRAL – NC constitutional amendments: Legislature approves citizen-only voting, rejects repeal of Jim Crow literacy test law
North Carolina Legislature – HB 1074 – Constitutional Amendment/Citizens-Only Voting
North Carolina Legislature – HB 44 – Constitutional Amendment/Repeal Literacy Test
The Guardian – Far-right US groups coalescing to stoke unfounded fears of non-citizens voting

BallotPedia – Laws permitting noncitizens to vote in the United States

Groups Taking Action:
Democracy North Carolina,  NAACP High Point Chapter

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Find all of our reports at AmericanDemocracyMinute.org

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#Democracy #DemocracyNews #NorthCarolina #NoncitizenVoting #LiteracyTest #VoterSuppression

The post North Carolina Senate Sends ‘Citizen-Voting-Only’ Ballot Measure to Voters, Fails Measure to Repeal Jim Crow-Era Literacy Test appeared first on American Democracy Minute.

The American Democracy Minute Radio Report & Podcast for Aug. 14, 2023

Today’s Script

(Variations occur with audio due to editing for time. Today’s Links below the script)

You’re listening to the American Democracy Minute, keeping YOUR government by and for the people.

Mississippi has the highest percentage of voting-age citizens who are not able to vote due to past felony convictions.  In early August, a federal court struck down the responsible Jim Crow provision in Mississippi’s constitution, citing “cruel and unusual punishment.” 

While several states have restored voting rights to felons in recent years, Mississippi clung to its lifetime ban for felons convicted of perjury, forgery, embezzlement, bigamy, bribery, theft, arson, or obtaining money or goods under false pretense.  It later removed burglary and added rape & murder to that list.  

Democracy Docket reports that unlike states restoring rights upon completion of sentence and/or parole, the only way for Mississippians to have their rights restored was a two-thirds vote by both houses of the legislature, and a sign off by the governor.  That happened only 18 times between 2013 and 2018.   In 2020, 11% of all Mississippians, and 16% of Black Mississippians, could not vote.

On August 4th, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down Section 241 of the state constitution, but denied the plaintiff’s additional claim under the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. 

August 17th the State of Mississippi filed for a rehearing, but at the moment, as many as 235,000 returning felons stand to have their voting rights restored. 

We have links to the case and the racist history behind it at AmericanDemocracyMinute.org.  I’m Brian Beihl. 

Today’s Links

Articles & Resources:
Center for Public Integrity – (2022) More than 15% of Black Mississippi residents permanently barred from voting
Democracy Docket – Mississippi Felony Disenfranchisement Challenge (Hopkins)

Mississippi Today – (2020) Study: 11% of all Mississippians, 16% of Black Mississippians can’t vote because of felony convictions
Advancement Project – (2021) Our Voices, Our Votes: Felony Disenfranchisement and Re-entry in Mississippi
Mississippi Today – 5th Circuit panel strikes down Mississippi’s lifetime felony voting ban
The Marshall Project – Voting Rights for Felons

Groups Taking Action:
The Sentencing Project, Mississippi Votes,  ACLU Mississippi

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Find all of our reports at AmericanDemocracyMinute.org
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#Democracy  #DemocracyNews #RightsRestoration #ProtectPollWorkers

The post Federal Court Strikes Down Mississippi Constitutional Provision With Racist History Keeping 11% of Its Population from Voting appeared first on American Democracy Minute.

Listen!

Today’s Links

Articles:
ProPublica – The Fight Against an Age-Old Effort to Block Americans From Voting

Groups Taking Action:
ACLU Georgia, FairFight, NAACP Legal Defense Fund, New Georgia Project

You’re listening to the American Democracy Minute, keeping YOUR government by and for the people.

An investigative report just released by nonprofit news organization ProPublica follows the story of one woman’s quest to provide assistance to low-literacy voters in her community. It also shows the efforts by local and state government to stop that assistance, which is guaranteed by the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

The article chronicles the efforts of Olivia Coley-Pearson from Coffee County, Georgia, where one-third of the population reads only at a basic level. Coley-Pearson helps those needing assistance at the polls with voter registration and ballots, as affirmed by Congress in Voting Rights Act changes in 1982.

But ProPublica’s reporting shows that while the literacy tests used to suppress Black voters in the 1960s may be gone, literacy is still wielded as a weapon in some polling places. Ballots and registrations are sometimes invalidated for misspellings in addresses and names, or for errors in dates.

Some state legislatures have even passed laws which require illiterate voters to explain in a WRITTEN affidavit as to why they need assistance. Other states prevent from bringing sample ballots to the polls, and limit the number of volunteers providing assistance.

Coley-Pearson herself has been reported by election officials, investigated, brought up on baseless charges of improperly assisting voters in what smacks of an effort to intimidate her from her work.

That literacy would still be a barrier to Americans who make the effort to exercise their constitutionally-guaranteed right to vote demonstrates just how far we are from a free and fair election system. Find a link to ProPublica’s excellent article at AmericanDemocracyMinute.org.

For the American Democracy Minute, I’m Brian Beihl

The post ADM for Sept. 16, 2022: A New ProPublica Report Chronicles One Women’s Quest to Assist Low-Literacy Voters – And the Attempts to Stop Her appeared first on American Democracy Minute.