The Return of the Poll Tax?

by   |  September 21, 2006

How would you like to pay for voting? The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a bill (H.R. 4844) that amounts to just that. By requiring voters to show a government-issued photo identification card starting in 2008, the misnamed Federal Election Integrity Act of 2006 is effectively making inordinate demands on people who simply want to exercise their right to vote. Most drivers’ licenses don’t certify someone’s citizenship and accordingly don’t meet the criteria set forth by H.R. 4844. In order to cast a ballot, people would have to get a document such as a passport that will cost them $97 (not to mention a six-week wait.) Kind of a stiff price for casting your vote, isn’t it? In other words, this is a de facto poll tax which, as the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights has said, disproportionately affects “racial and ethnic minorities, the elderly, people with disabilities, rural voters, students, the homeless, low-income people, frequent movers and members of large households.” The bill comes in the wake of attempts throughout the country to pass state legislation requiring similar strictures. The commonsense fact that no citizen should pay money to vote has been recognized by judges in places such as Georgia and Missouri, two of the most recent instances where these so-called “Voter ID” laws were thrown out. It was only in July that Congress reauthorized the 1965 Voting Rights Act, the landmark legislation that helped thousands of Americans gain access to the ballot box. Attempts to limit the ability of people to vote not only contradict its intent, but establish a grave precedent of discrimination. Working families should bear this in mind when they cast their own vote on November 7.