Myriad reports from across the nation of new voter I.D. requirements aimed at disenfranchising mostly people of color and older people hearken to the day when targeted Americans, principally African Americans in the South, had to pass preposterous tests to qualify to vote. One such voter registration “test” in Selma, Alabama, involved guessing how many jelly beans are in a jar. Today’s voter- nullification efforts, although less clown-like than the jelly-bean test, could result in the same results: keeping people from the polls. Bingo.
Seemingly basic requirements, like producing a birth certificate may be impossible for some seniors. A recent AARP online bulletin states the following:
“Nearly one in five citizens over 65 — about 8 million — lacks a current, government-issued photo ID, a 2006 Brennan Center study found. Most people prove their eligibility to vote with a driver’s license, but people over 65 often give up their license and don’t replace it with the state-issued ID that some states offer non-driving residents. People over 65 also are more likely to lack birth certificates because they were born before recording births was standard procedure.”
For rural people, state issued-identification can cost $25 or more—and to attain the document individuals have to have the transport to go to a state office, sometimes a prohibitive distance from home. Additionally, a ballot not translated in Spanish may be a struggle for an immigrant who is not competent in English, despite years of working, paying taxes and contributing to the country. The list goes on.
While it is easy to judge “these people” as other, I must acknowledge that it is easy for me: I registered to vote years ago, and each election I receive a nice little notice about my polling station from the Board of Elections of the City of New York. I leisurely saunter over to my poll site, two blocks from where I live, on election mornings on my way to work. Only once have I had to wait more than an hour to fulfill my civic duty. While there have been issues with the new voting machines throughout New York City in the past, they were due to incompetence, not obstructionism. Nothing like Kansas—the state of origin for President Barack Obama’s mother and maternal grandparents—where top officials tried to remove the President from the ballot by invoking the “birther” argument. This nutty movement was reigned in and abandoned on September 13 of this year.
With all the drama this election cycle, I am reminded of when one of my housemates at Tufts, Benita, a Chicago resident, returned home to work on the mayoral campaign of Harold Washington. Washington went on to become the first Black mayor of that city in 1983, following an aggressive voter-registration initiative that added 100,000 mostly people of color, poor whites and independents to the rolls. According to Benita’s accounts, police loyal to the political “machine” systematically arrested young Black men and held them until the polls closed to ensure that the youngsters would not vote. They were profiled and nullified in one fell swoop! I was riveted—and repulsed—by Benita’s account of that bitterly contested race. Could this be America?
For those of us like me who have it easy, and especially for those of us who don’t, Affirming Community: Vote. The time, money, travel and inconvenience are all well worth it. And if you can help someone who is less able to get to the polls, please do so. I am sure the families of Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner, the Four Little Girls, the countless families of the people whose names we know and those we don’t who sacrificed for the Voting Rights Act, for civil rights, and for their own dignity and freedom—and therefore ours—would say it is well worth it. They paid in blood so we wouldn’t have to.
Please check out the nonpartisan Election Protection Coalition, formed to ensure that all voters have an equal opportunity to participate in the political process for current information on voting rights challenges nationwide. You can also click on a tab by state for comprehensive information about registration, polling sites and everything you need to know to exercise your right to vote. Please visit http://www.866ourvote.org/state .
One Love, One Vote, BE.
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