Among the Intellectualoids: Criminal Voters
Gahr, Evan
by Evan Gahr Criminal Voters Democrats pursue a major cell, er, voting bloc. ~ n 1963, Martin Luther King, imprisoned for civil disobedience, wrote his famous "Letter from Birmingham...
...In its view, minorities are disproportionately incarcerated or othenvise engaged by the racially biased criminal justice sy~tenr...
...How long should this punishment last...
...Talk about political prisoners...
...A few blocks away, Smitty, a convicted drug dealer still on parole and thus ineligible to vote, expressed similar sentiments...
...Currently, 47 states and the District of Columbia don't let incarcerated felons vote...
...Virginia this year streamlined the process that allows non-violent felons to regain voting rights on completion of their sentences...
...Baker's letter in the July 27 Daily News said the law "perpetuates racial oppression and exploitation...
...Ex-cons are simply the obvious starting place...
...Like the recent push against the death penalty, the nationwide move to restore voting rights for felons wants criminals to be seen as victims- even civil rights heroes...
...In December 1999, the Philadelphia NAACP made a similar claim in an amicus brief for a federal lawsuit on behalf of current and ex-felons in Pennsylvania...
...Recent history provides a cautionary tale about Republican acquiescence in the perversion of civil rights legislation...
...Legislation introduced by Rep...
...As NA4CP Washington Director Hilary Shelton testified before Congress last October, "Felony voting restrictions are the last vestige of the voting prohibitions in the United States...
...Indeed, when Yale Law students made the vote dilution argument on behalf of Theodore Baker and his David Dinkins fan club at Greenhaven Correctional Facility, courts took heed...
...Jeb Bush wouldn't answer the question, the bill faltered...
...Michael," for instance, who tells TAS he spent five years in an upstate NewYork prison for a felony conviction that is too "personal" to name, wanted to vote for thenRep...
...put it, "We start where it is possible to succeed...
...So long as Gov...
...Meanwhile, last October a House Judiciary subcommittee finally held hearings on Rep...
...C onsider how the debate played in Florida, where 3o percent of all black men are ineligible to vote because of current or prior jail terms...
...n 1963, Martin Luther King, imprisoned for civil disobedience, wrote his famous "Letter from Birmingham Jail...
...Like Martin Luther King, "these people were skipped of their civil rights," Cronin said in a telephone interview...
...John Cowers (D-Mich...
...Others should be nervous, too...
...It's not a Gulag...
...the new provision has proved a godsend to the prisoner rights movement...
...The consequent disenfranchisement reduces overall minorib...
...Everybody ;~ anted to vote, but Iprison authorities] said 'you don't have no rights.'" Today, he does...
...But this cMc-minded bunch of murderers, robbers, and drug dealers had stumbled upon an unexpected obstacle...
...I have faith that the morally correct path, blazed by the inspiration of a more democratic union shall ultimately prevail, and this imperfection in our society too shall be corrected...
...A total of four million Americans- including 13 percent of black men--can't vote this November because of their criminal records...
...are denied the vote...
...In Washington state, where felons are disbarred for life unless they get clemency, Muhammad Shabazz Farrakhan's federa] lawsuit continues apace...
...It attracted wide attention with a 1995 study that found one in three black men in their twenties were entangled with the criminal justice system...
...But when prominent black legislators called the matter a litmus lest of his support for minorities, Bush signed on...
...in Stormville, New York, were determined to help re-elect thenMayor David Dinkins...
...Released the following year, he won a court battle in 1998 to run on the Republican ballot for state representative, even though he still owed $24,000 to his victims...
...Though it remains an uphill battle, the stakes are considerable, particularly since former denizens of the "Big House" are by nrost accounts an untapped Democratic constituency...
...In a 198o case unrelated to disenfranchisement, the Supreme Court ruled that discriminatory intent is required to establish a violation of the Voting Rights Act...
...Ed Koch for mayor in 1977...
...The penal system is for punishment," said state Sen...
...In 1993, a federal appeals court panel upheld the case...
...Senator Dole explained that he accepted the civil rights lobby's claim that "intent is often hard to prove...
...Baker is now deceased...
...As lawyer Cronin notes, "Some of these prisons are big, like cities...
...N The American Spectator "J~ne 2ooo 61...
...voting power...
...The current battle has ostensibly focused on ex-cons who are said to have "paid their debt to society...
...But the real objective is to undermine all criminal disenfranchisement laws...
...Like all ex-felons in New York State who have completed their senfences, Michael is eligible to vote...
...But his larger cause, which as recently as 1996 many liberals wouldn't even touch, has lately gained some fomridable allies...
...The Sentencing Project and Human Rights Watch even suggest that denying the vote to persons in jail could violate international law...
...This, of course, was before "civil rights" became a cover for group entitlement...
...Criminal disenfranchisement, which the 14th Amendment expressly allows, predates the country's founding...
...For most of the last decade, there were scattered lawsuits and complaints by prisoner rights advocates about criminal disenfranchisement...
...The judges split 55. This meant an earlier lower court ruling against the prisoners stood...
...Congressional Democrats pushed for legislation to overrule the decision...
...The cumulative impact clearly dilutes the political power of the African-American community...
...County Clerk Charles Stern had worried that, with 2,5oo prisoners amid the total town population of 4,8oo , they could have affected bond issues and school board elections...
...Their children fight in foreign wars...
...Since 1993, at least three federal lawsuits employed the disparate-impact test on behalf of criminal offenders...
...As both Judiciary committees declared, such restrictions should in no way be confused with a number of devices the Voting Rights Act would ban...
...Marc Stern, a voting rights expert at the American Jewish Congress, says "these are not frivolous lawsuits...
...Fourteen states disenfranchise felons for life...
...Baker and eight other inmates at the Greenhaven Correctional Facili...
...Will the jailhouse become a Democratic mainstay, like labor union conventions, feminist gatherings, and Buddhist temples...
...Thus, denying the vote to felons is a racist ploy akin to the notorious literacy tests...
...Cowers in 1994 went nowhere...
...But in January t997, the movement hit upon a winning strategy-with the help of two media-savvy groups that have long understood the best way to discredit the nation's war on crime...
...Over the last year, Democrats have ioined a nationwide campaign by "prisoner rights" advocates against the laws in nearly eve U state which render felons ineligible to vote...
...Amid debate over the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act, lawmakers on both sides of the aide--including then-freshman Senator Ted Kennedy--forswore interfering with the disenfranchisement of felons (either in jail or out...
...In 1993, Theodore Baker, imprisoned for second-degree murder, wrote a letter from an upstate New York jail...
...It finally failed in 1996 when the appeals court heard the case en banc...
...Sentencing Project Assistant Director Marc Mauer and Human Rights Watch Associate Counsel Jamie Fellner have written that "it is hard to imagine that permitting inmates to vote by absentee ballot once a year would pose an undue burden on prison operations...
...Just days before the November 1998 election, the Sentencing Project and Human Rights Watch issued a major report on disenfranchisement...
...As Rep...
...They're still citizens...
...He lost the election, but remains an outspoken Republican and heads an organization called the National Young Black Republicans...
...The case, which charges minority vote dilution, was filed in 1996 when Farrakhan (no relation to Louis) was incarcerated for theft by deception...
...60 Ju~e 2000 ' The American Spectator In recent months at least ten states have weighed measures to liberalize criminal disenfranchisement laws...
...Denying the vote to felons is seen as a racist ploy akin to literacy tests...
...But the cause attracted little attention...
...They could make a whole ward...
...Conservative activists and writers have sneered, but they should hold the Iaughs...
...New York disenfranchises convicted felons...
...The case already survived a motion for summary judgment in 1997 . New motions are due June 7' Certainly, there have been setbacks...
...would force all states to allow criminals on probation or parole to vote in federal elections...
...State and national GOP officials say the group has no party ties...
...Conyers's legislation...
...In 32 states, parolees EVAN GAHR is a contributing writer for the American Enterprise magazine and a former New York Post press critic...
...Bush, Texas liberalized its law in 1997 and no longer requires ex-felons to wait two years before voting...
...Its 1997 report noted that one in seven black men could not vote because of their criminal records...
...The Sentencing Project, which the press usually calls an objective "research group," was actually spawned by the National Legal Aid and Defender Association...
...Eventually, the GOP caved--at the behest of Henry Hyde and Bob Dole...
...It has garnered support in Congress, where a bill proposed by Rep...
...If present trends continue," it predicted, "as many as 3o-4 o percent of the next generation of black men will lose their right to vote...
...He laments that "Giuliani made the city into a police state...
...Farrakhan's lawyer, Dennis Cronin, sees nothing "incongruous" about using civil rights law for prison inmates...
...On March 17 , the proposed constitutional amendment sailed through a Florida senate committee...
...Mandy Dawson-White...
...In 1998 Utah barred inmate voting...
...Maryland's General Assembly is considering a measure to restore voting rights to repeat offenders...
...The movement to correct this "iniustice" just won tacit encouragement from Vice President Gore...
...It's thus safe to assume it wasn't racially motivated...
...Republicans balked--and were cast as racially insensitive or worse...
...In Oregon last year, state legislators closed a loophole that allowed inmates at a federal prison in Sheridan to vote...
...Maxine Waters (D-Calif...
...In Massachusetts, the state legislature is expected soon to adopt a similar measure-although the final decision rests with voters...
...The report actually focused on disparate impact generally, but only the voting issue created a buzz...
...But the trump card remains race...
...Under the other Gov...
...A registered Democrat, he even carries his voter registration card in his wallet and says he prefers Hillary for Senate because she is sympathetic to the poor...
...Now it doesn't have to be proved...
...In 1998, a group of black lawmakers introduced legislation that would automatically restore voting privileges to some ex-convicts...
...Funded by liberal foundations and tax dollars ($204,000 from the Justice Department in 1999), the Washington, D.C.-based organization spent much of the last decade impugning stiff sentences as unfair to minorities...
...Countless stories began appearing nationwide on the "shocking" numbers of disenfranchised minorities...
...In 1982 Congress amended the Voting Rights Act to expressly say that even laws without "discriminatory purpose" could violate the act if they diluted minority voting power...
Vol. 33 • June 2000 • No. 5
