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Thoughts on Crawford: Voter ID

By Calvin Massey

In Crawford v. Marion County Election Board the Supreme Court has upheld Indiana's voter ID law, in a splintered set  of opinions with no majority opinion. I have only scanned the opinions but it appears that the Stevens opinion (joined by CJ Roberts and Kennedy) applies the balancing test of Anderson v. Celebrezze in a very deferential fashion: So long as the state has plausible concerns to impose the regulation (even if those conerns are largely unsupported by the evidence) the Anderson  test is satisfied.  Justice Scalia, joined by Thomas and Alito, think that Burdick should apply: So long as the regulation imposes a non-severe and non-discriminatory burden on voting, deference to state concerns should govern.  Under Marks the Stevens opinion appears to be the guiding precedent.  Justice Souter, joined by Ginsburg, dissented because the state's concerns were not adeqautely supported by the evidence.  Breyer dissented separately in a characteristically ad hoc approach:  Some of the regulations were too severe.  The judgment leaves open as-applied challenges to the law. 

Despite claims that the Indiana statute is a partisan measure to depress voting by groups likely to vote Democratic, I continue to have a hard time understanding what is so constitutionally infirm about ensuring that persons casting ballots are who they claim to be. You can't shift your own money from one bank account to another without doing so.  Isn't voting at least as precious? 

UPDATE: Kathleen Bergin beat me to the posting, but as readers can see, we apparently disagree on the case.

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on April 28, 2008 (boomark / email).