What's really troubling to me is the "they are the enemy" stuff. Not
being able to say the name of a party, for example, without adding
adjectives and/or intensifiers. Americans love competition, I think,
and I think that's a big part of it. But at some point it becomes
pathological…at some point people start believing the "other
side" is Actually Evil, and things get unhealthy.

I don't vote early or do mail-ins, because part of my love for
the process involves the physical showing up…that we-are-all-
actually-here-this-day gathering of citizens of all kinds. I love the
camaraderie, the civitas, the sense of constructive participation
and coordination.

On these days I feel optimistic. I feel that the nutjob stuff
you read on the internets maybe isn't so important…maybe we
all have moments of doubt about the intent of others, but
in the end we really are on the same team, striving for America's
success, just in our own ways.

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net

A right that is granted on a state level though, and only if the state chooses too. No federal law ensures the right to vote for anyone, it only stipulates scanario's that can't be used to prevent someone from voting. It never actually grants the right to vote in federal elections.

Consider the states that have chosen to prevent felons and handicapped individuals from voting. And then how some states moved on to disallow people without identification. If if a state chose to do so, they could prevent you from voting for any number of reasons, because it's governed by state law.

I thought Pluto was demoted, how did he get to be in charge? =(

I'm not going to disagree with the precise claim here because I don't know the details comfortably enough one way or the other. However, this logic does not necessarily hold: you could still have a federal right, in addition to federally-sanctioned restrictions on said right. From the fact that states are allowed to restrict the right under some conditions, it does not follow that the federal government has no control.

@DavidHaley

Supreme Court Ruling - Bush v Gore

II - B

[1][2][3] The individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote for electors for the President of the United States unless and until the state legislature chooses a statewide election as the means to implement its power to appoint members of the electoral college. U.S. Const., Art. II, § 1. This is the source for the statement in McPherson v. Blacker, 146 U.S. 1, 35, 13 S.Ct. 3, 36 L.Ed. 869 (1892), that the state legislature's power to select the manner for appointing electors is plenary; it may, if it so chooses, select the electors itself, which indeed was the manner used by state legislatures in several States for many years after the framing of our Constitution. Id., at 28-33, 13 S.Ct. 3. History has now favored the voter, and in each of the several States the citizens themselves vote for Presidential electors. When the state legislature vests the right to vote for President in its people, the right to vote as the legislature has prescribed is fundamental; and one source of its fundamental nature lies in the equal weight accorded to each vote and the equal dignity owed to each voter. The State, of course, after granting the franchise in the special context of Article II, can take back the power to appoint electors. See id., at 35, 13 S.Ct. 3 (" '[T]here is no doubt of the right of the legislature to resume the power **530 at any time, for it can neither be taken away nor abdicated' ") (quoting S.Rep. No. 395, 43d Cong., 1st Sess., 9 (1874)).


If we don't have the right to vote for electors (the ones whose vote actually matters), how can we have a "right" to vote in a presidential election? This is more than a difference between a democracy and a republic.

As I said, I wasn't referring to the veracity of the claim, but to the specific reasoning given that because a state may place restrictions, there cannot be any federal right. That reasoning is not correct, but that doesn't mean that the resulting claim is necessarily incorrect. Incidentally, the ruling you provide does give a federal right assuming the state uses a statewide election. (That's kind of a funny statement, I'll grant, but, eh.)

I've always considered rights to be absolute and without variance. The fact that the right in question can change depending on how a state chooses to handle a situation is what makes me feel like I don't really have the "right", I have the "privilege". I really don't know much about politics or law though, so I could be completely off on all of this. =)

Well, a conditional right is still a right, really. You can think of it as an absolute right under certain absolute conditions. :wink:

The funny thing about the above statement is that they're saying it's only a right if the states say it is. Leaving it up to what could be potentially arbitrary discretion like that removes the "rightness" of it IMO. On the other hand, having a clear and absolute list of conditions under which a right may no longer apply doesn't bother me.

I like Mills's view of it: the right to liberty stops at that point where you are infringing upon other people's liberties. It's still a right, it's just conditioned on you not messing it up for other people.

That would be because of how electing a president is done under the US Constitution.

See specifically:
US Constitution - Article Two
US Constitution -Twelth Amendment

Chris Bailey wrote:


It's a quirk of history that the Constitution doesn't explicitly
outline such a right, but it does not mean you do not enjoy it.

A skim of the election clauses could lead the naive reader to
presume that the states are delegated absolute jurisdiction over
the selection of their electors, but as has been implied in this
thread, the federal govt has established its primacy over the
decision of whom to disenfranchise, and the net effect is that
American citizens have been (and one presumes will continue to
be) protected by the federal government in their exercise the
franchise….up to a point.

For example, states have been allowed to take the vote away
from felons. There is a certain amount of control that the
states have been permitted. But the Civil War settled the question
of Federal supremacy. Attempting to assert a state right to
*arbitrarily* disenfranchise citizens would soon be settled federally
in a way your state would have to simply accept.


DavidHaley wrote:


I believe my favorite phrasing is Holmes:

"The right to swing my fist ends where the other man's nose begins."

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net

EDIT: IANAL. You can actually argue that the right to vote is implicit in the wording
of the Constitution, and for example in the 14th amendment. When I say it's not explicit,
I mean that it does not lay out exact eligibility…it tends to say what you can't
disqualify for, which kind of implies the right exists in the first place.

That wasn't exactly the point – the point was that it is a funny way to use the term "right" in the context of federal rights when states independently decide whether or not you get that right.


Ah, I like that one too. :smile:

A state could decide to allowing only their state legislatures to choose presidents and vice presidents, and constitutionally there is very little the federal government could do. If it was found to be acceptable by the state's constitution it would come down to the federal judicial branch to decide if precedent and established principles would preclude the state from doing so, but they would have to come to a decision that disagreed with the US Constitution to make such a decision.

Yeah, next time a state tries to pull something like that, I'll just sit by waiting to see what happens… :smirk:

Meh.

Problem 1 would be getting the citizens of the state not to show
up at the state capitol to defenestrate the legislature.

Problem 2 is that this position is a Constitutional law opinion, which
in the end is subject to the opinion of the Supreme Court…which
has consistently held up the notion that law abiding adult citizens have
the right to vote. You can think otherwise all you want, but that's not
the case law you'll find.

There are folks who interpret certain literalisms to mean that
the federal government can't tax your income. Their arguments do
not wind up working well in practice.

Similarly, reading the constitution but skipping the amendments will give
you a distorted sense of who is allowed to vote, and ignoring case law will
further blind you to what's actually been decided as the law of the land in
for-real terms.

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net

It sometimes annoys me when people call voting a duty.

When I was in 9th grade and had no intention of voting, a teacher tried to make me feel like a bad American for not voting because "people have fought and died for you to go vote."

The way I've always looked at it is that people have fought and died for my right to choose whether or not I would like to vote.

I think trying to mandate to someone that they -should- vote is just as bad as trying to keep people from voting.

Allow people their choice, because afterall, choice is freedom.

For the record, I voted today.

As we already vote for our state legislators we would still be represented. Would people protest or demonstrate? Of course.


They have the right to vote if they meet a state's requirements that do not otherwise violate the laws or the Constitution.


I have posted links to the relevant parts of the Constitution dealing with presidential elections. Can you do the same for these generalized "folks" position on taxation?


Who skipped amendments?

The presented was a hypothetical that is based in the Constitution. I agree that the hypothetical is not a likely scenario, I was stating that it would be Constitutionally sound.

I have seen no federal rulings stating that every state must allow a popular vote for president, that every state must give all electors to the winner of a popular vote, or that every citizen, including felons, be allowed to vote in every state. In two of these cases (all electors and felons) case law would bear out the rights of the states to decide for themselves.

As long as the election was carried out consistently, and without regard for areas touched on by other laws (such as purely done by separating the rights of voters into sub-sections by race, economic status or other determinant), and all citizens had the same right to representation in the presidential election (which they would if their elected state representitives were the only ones to vote), what Constitutional objection could be raised? The Twelfth Amendment is the Constitutional framework for carrying out presidential elections in this representational republic.

To HK:
I think it is a duty to consider whether or not you should vote. I establish a considerable difference between abstaining by deliberate choice and abstaining by indifference, ignorance, laziness, or so on. Whether you abstain by going to vote and entering a blank vote or by not going to vote is irrelevant to me as long as the choice was made very deliberately.

Voting is a responsibility that comes with the privileges of living in this country. It is rather selfish and short-sighted to expect to get all the benefits without having to take on any responsibility for managing the country's future. It's not just a question of people having fought and died for the right to vote and voting merely for their sake.


To Mabus:
So what exactly is your point? Are you advocating that states not hold elections? Are you advocating anything at all?

There are no such rulings I am aware of. Note, however, that I
object to the apparent suggestion that I'm saying such things
as a guarantee of the vote for felons exists. I find this
disingenuous on your part.




My objection, you'll note, is a how-things-work-for-real one,
not a will-an-elephant-hang-off-a-cliff-tied-by-a-daisy one.

I'm frankly surprised you did not bring up Bush v. Gore, which
explicitly supports your position. From a Constitutional Law
point of view, your argument is "sound".

From the point of view of Americans who've experienced the
civil rights struggles of the past 50 years, however, it is
absurd. The amendments I referred to were the ones which
address suffrage issues, and in real world terms it is difficult
to imagine that a state would be allowed to turn decades of
hard fought justice on its head and arrogate to its legislature
electoral choice in defiance of its constituency's wishes
in the majority.

I don't think it would work in the real world. I think the
citizens of the state would be able to mount a successful
defense of their franchise, though of course I agree with you that
there's a legal argument to support your position.

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net

If you look back through the thread I provided links to the relevant portions of the US Constitution, then answered a statement dealing with how states could be forced to accept voting with a hypothetical situation.

People seem to forget that we are governed by the Constitution, not by some random set of "how it supposed to be and has been since I can remember" thoughts. I have discussed the issue of presidential elections, electoral college, popular votes and the history of presidential elections in this country many, many times over the last decade, and been aware of much of it for far longer.

So, to be brief, I was not "advocating" anything. I was pointing to the facts surrounding the discussion of presidential elections, and providing a hypothetical case that would still be Constitutional.