Sen. Clinton Pushes for Voting Holiday (wants all ex-felons to vote)

[truthpusher]

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=512&u=/ap/20050217/ap_on_go_co/voting_machines_clinton_1&printer=1

Sen. Clinton Pushes for Voting Holiday

43 minutes ago

By DEVLIN BARRETT, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (news - web sites), a possible White House candidate in 2008, joined 2004 nominee John Kerry (news - web sites) and other Democrats Thursday in urging that Election Day be made a federal holiday to encourage voting.

She also pushed for legislation that would allow all ex-felons to vote.

Standing with Massachusetts Sen. Kerry and other Democrats who had alleged voting irregularities in the 2004 contest, Clinton said, "Once again we had a federal election that demonstrates we have a long way to go."


lots more here:
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=512&u=/ap/20050217/ap_on_go_co/voting_machines_clinton_1&printer=1

[Ironpost]

1. I've been advocating this for years.

complete with parades, encouraging voter turnout.

[Imagevision]

43. It's absolutely ignorant to be voting during the week - The..

Ukraine had their election on the weekend, at least you don't have to be concerned with having to hurry and run right back to work or back home to care for family etc.

REpugs will come up with dumb reasons as to why this is a bad idea?

Go Hillary!

[arwalden]

60. But, But, But... It's ALWAYS Been On A Tuesday

Brace yourself for the folks who will claim that we must protect Traditional Voting Values. There's bound to be a "Defense of Voting on Tuesday Act" (DOVOTA).

[CBGLuthier]

2. the first is a good idea but the second

I think allowing felons to vote is a matter of state rights and would require a constitutional amendment along the lines of the 19th amendment to be done.

[PunkPop]

5. That's "ex" felons

Might still be a states right issue but I think there's a big difference between letting felons vote and letting those who have already served their sentence and paid their debt to society vote.

[CBGLuthier]

16. I never said I was against it

And sorry I forgot the qualifier ex.

But I still believe it would require a constitutional amendment.

Women were allowed to vote in a few states before the 19th amendment. But the passage of that amendment changed the rules for all states and removed being male as a requirement.

I think it would take something different. I am alittle too busy right now (really, I am at work) to dig through the whole constitution but generally speaking those who qualify for the right to vote has always been up to the states.

The same would be true of the former requirement in some states that you be 21 to vote. It took an amendment to change that too.

[MAlibdem]

49. Actually, it should have required a constitutional amendment the other way

to PREVENT them from voting should have had to have been constitutionally mandated.

[ZR2]

21. Just because they are released from prison

does not mean that is the end of their sentence. If the states allow "ex-felons" to vote, should they not also allow them to carry firearms again ?

[Imagevision]

51. Ex-felons carrying Firearms? you sound like a repug ..no they

shouldn't have the right to carry firearms...so why go there??

[Imagevision]

45. Ex-felons quite obviously paid they're debt to society!

what's the big deal? if the crime/offense is 5-10-30 years in the past, what the hell is the biggie! If anything it shows they're concerned with the the goings on of their country.

[trogdor]

52. So we qualify this a bit further.

Ex-cons who have served ALL of their obligations to the criminal justice system, should no longer be considered criminals. This should exclude parolees and those who are serving probation.

[Maine-ah]

53. how can anyone be an "ex" felon?

once convicted, even after serving time, you're still a convicted felon. I'm probably wrong, but.. maybe someone could explain this to me. :shrug:

[mazzarro]

6. Please explain how that is a states right..

eom

[methinks2]

12. Voting particulars have always been a states right.

That's how they've always controlled things in the south. Did you know that in Fla. the polls close at 7pm on election night. One fender-bender on the interstate and people miss the chance to vote. By keeping it the provision of small municipalites, they make it hard to challenge what happens. You can get an incredible run-around from a small local office and have no real way to get a problem fixed if they don't try hard enough to help you resolve issues.

[Blue to the bone]

37. Fender bender?

Come on....don't the polls open at something like 6AM?

Wait till the last minute to go vote and you may miss your chance!

[trogdor]

55. In New York they do.

In NY, polls open at 6 AM and close as 9 PM. PLENTY of time to go vote, and long lines are rare. Unfortunately, so is high turnout, but that's a topic for another thread.

[BrendaStarr]

57. Where have you been?

In the last election there were reports of people turned away though they were in line for hours when the polls closed.

[CBGLuthier]

18. Here you go

At the Continental Congress meeting in Philadelphia, the Framers of the Constitution could not agree on who should be given the right to vote. As a result, the Constitution only states that members of the House of Representatives were to be elected by the people of each state who, under state law were eligible to vote for the lower house of their state legislature.

The Constitution, therefore, left to each state government the power to decide who could vote. As a result, many of the early battles over the right to vote took place at the state level.


http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=right+to+vote+constitution

To be more specific, I think it comes under the tenth amendment.

Qualifiers were removed or changed by the 15th, 20th and 26th amendment.

http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html

[Lexingtonian]

29. you've left out the 14th

The 15th was passed because of the problems enforcing the 14th.

[CBGLuthier]

35. The 14th did not address voting rights directly

Section one wuld be the relevant portion about individual rights and while it may be implicit that voting rights should be granted to the "new" citizens, it does not in itself state anything about voting rights which was what my post was concerned with.

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

[Massacure]

10. Let ex felons vote for federal elections and not state.

If they can vote for state or not is a state right. Problem solved.

[CBGLuthier]

17. But you can't do that

without a constitutional amendment.

I am certainly not a rabid states rights type of person but that doesn't change the nature of the constitution.

I will make an effort to find the portion that addresses this.

[Imagevision]

48. Ex-felons quite obviously paid they're debt to society! they pay

they're share of taxes! And a voting Holiday is a MUST!

[bluestateguy]

13. Right now we have a patchwork quilt of different laws

And it causes considerable confusion and legitimate questions concerning equal protection and privilleges and immunities under the 14th Amendment. In Vermont and Maine a prisoner in jail for mass murder can vote by absentee ballot. In Florida you lose your voting rights forever and ever if you commit a felony, even after you pay your debt to society.

[Lexingtonian]

23. well, no

Technically there's an equal protection problem in disenfranchising ex-felons, parolees, and probationers. You can't really have American citizens walking the streets, holding jobs, paying taxes, getting married, having children- conducting all the usual business affairs of society- but then deny them their vote in how the whole is run.

But the state courts in the South and Midwest, the federal appeals courts covering those regions, and the USSC are stacked with people of such views/politics that they minimize (if not eliminate) enforcement of the 14th Amendment in many respects. It is the systematic injustice of our times and it defines the present partisan division and its vehemence. That's where/how our elections, race matters, gay marriage, womens' rights, and injust taxation issues are corrupted and prevented and undermined and denied.

Disenfranchising incarcerated folks is a state right. I think in states where politicians would not campaign in prisons, where elections would not turn on votes from prisons, and where coercion and bribery for votes from prison populations are not to be expected, it is fine to permit voting. But one should note that in states where incarcerated people are permitted to vote (Vermont, Maine, Massachusetts until 2000) the turnout rate is very small (~1-5%) and tends to be almost exclusively white collar criminals.

There are two reasons ex-felon disenfranchisement gets done: one is racial politics, and in the South misdemeanors perpetrated almost exclusively by black people (stealing small amounts of corn from fields) were generally raised to felonies during or after Reconstruction. The raising to felonies of possession of small amounts of e.g. crack is the most recent exploitable game in this politics- urban black people were so desperate to get the violent gangs off the streets in the Eighties that they pushed Democrats for upping sentences, but in so doing a price in political power was paid. Every state that disenfranchises ex-felons has a pardon process- and the ones that get pardoned tend to be white, male, and have wealthy parents or come from high status families in the South or the state incarcerated in.

The second reason, the reason "respectable" people still favor the practice, is a theory of criminality that proposes permanent demonic possession of people who have committed felonies. The reason has to do with the conditions of the past- arguably, a larger proportion of felonies in the past were in fact committed by sociopaths and psychopaths than are so now. But that has diminished for some reason, become increasingly regarded as exceptional rather than the rule over time. Maybe it's because mild mental illness is diagnosed earlier and suppressed more effectively, maybe it's because society has diffused the socioeconomic oppressiveness it had into forms that are less identifiable with particular kinds of people. Maybe it's simply the larger numbers of people that makes crimes that once seemed remarkable and informative seem banal and foolish. In any case, most/all states had ex-felon disenfranchisement laws and dismantled them between WW2 and roughly 1980 as badly founded and moral embarrassments.

Today it's very hard to find any compelling reason to ex-felon disenfranchisement laws other than racial politics. Ex-felons vote like the people of their social class and circumstances; being largely working class and poor, they vote more as elderly people, rarely if ever vote in the elections closely following release from incarceration, and turnout rate averages to something like 10%. They do vote Democratic, generally. (IIRC from the reports I've looked at at The Sentencing Project.) But when criminality has a black/Latino face and a chaotic/paranoid effect on communal life, and voters are largely elderly and largely white, demonization and false certainty about ex-felons are attitudes that are electoral majorities.

[Freedom_from_Chains]

25. Sure you can

"Technically there's an equal protection problem in disenfranchising ex-felons, parolees, and probationers. You can't really have American citizens walking the streets, holding jobs, paying taxes, getting married, having children- conducting all the usual business affairs of society- but then deny them their vote in how the whole is run."


States have been doing it for years.

[Lexingtonian]

27. that's not the point

It's still all a violation of 14th Amendment rights. 'Tradition' is not a justification, it's an excuse that somehow imagines as eternal answers things that were just stopgap solutions to problems at the time they were instituted.

[expatriot]

3. I hope they're smart and make them two SEPARATE pieces of legislation....

I believe in universal suffrage for felons but I think the holiday would have much more chance of succeeding if it were separate.

[scratchtasia]

4. A good bill

All of the ideas mentioned in the article are good ones. The most important one, though, is to ensure an accurate vote count.

[enough already]

7. Ex-Felons

Demanding the right of ex-felons to vote in this bill will doom an otherwise common sense proposal. Our "leaders" are incredibly stupid sometimes.

[Bridget Burke]

38. Why? Ex-felons regain their vote in most states.

Here in Texas, this happens two years after finishing the sentence--whether incarcerated, on parole or probation.

It wouldn't be simple to enact, due to Constitutional issues. But it's the right thing to do.

[enough already]

40. Politically Stupid

Makes no sense politically to attach this one to an overall reform bill. Everything else in this proposal is hard to argue against. Appearing to back ex-felons (while making no specific reference to ensuring that the military has access and votes are counted, for example) is just the type of red meat that pugs will latch onto to spin this thing into oblivion.

[Imagevision]

50. Ex-felons? -- All blacks should have the right to be counted!

[bluestateguy]

8. I support this bill

But if we make election day a national holiday, we have to mean business here: NO RETAIL outlets open for "Election Day Blowout Sales!", as they would then force all of their employees to work on election day, while white collar workers would get the day off. That would defeat the purpose of the law. Only emergency services and professions would be open for business.

[seriousstan]

19. Just how do you do that? How do you make it illegal to work?

What about public trasit and taxis? What about the utility comanies and hospitals? Grocery stores and fast food?

[bluestateguy]

20. reply

What about public trasit and taxis?

Mostly closed.

What about the utility comanies and hospitals?

See my above exception to emergency professions.

Grocery stores and fast food?

Closed. Those are exactly the people who need the day off to vote. Buy your groceries the day before election day. It won't be the end of the world.

[mudderfudder77]

47. Nice to say

But you can't tell a business owner who is barely making ends meet that he has to shut down his business for a day and lose all revenue he might have otherwise earned. Not going to happen, nor should it.

[jenn1977]

58. I agree!

Think of how many people could end up having to work "holiday" overtime.

[methinks2]

9. About time!!!

:yourock: Way to go Hillary!

[bleedingheart]

11. I am 100% behind this!!!!

[Placebo]

14. Long Overdue!

This Chicago Democrat supports you 100% Hillary!

Voting Holiday—YES!

[bemildred]

15. Attagirl! nt

[merci_me]

22. Only if it's on a Wednesday and the polls

are open for the same 24 hour period Maine to Hawaii.

If it's anywhere near a weekend, it becomes just another vacation get-a-way. In fact, Tuesday without a holiday has a better chance for turnout than Tuesday that's a holiday, when people would take one vacation day on Monday and have a FIVE day weekend.

And guess who would STILL be working the holiday.....the working poor.

With polls open for a full 24 hours, people who work shift work still have the same opportunity to get to the polls. That means, hotel workers, restaurant workers, retail workers, police and fire fighters, hospital staffs, those who would have to work, holiday or not.

It also means with every poll opening and closing at the same minute, there's no effect in California from the results on the east coast. This can make a HUGE difference in state and local races.

Mary

[Dr Fate]

24. I support Hillary on this one- good job, Hill. n/t

n/t

[tilsammans]

26. Yay!

I'm all for it. Make it a full 24 hours.

Go, Hill!

[superconnected]

28. I support this also

Good job Hillary!

Sometimes I wonder who's side you're on, and I'm especially not sure lately, but good job on this one.

[98geoduck]

30. Martha Stewart will be able to vote again....Yippee!!!

[jljamison]

31. a good start but doesn't solve the problem

while this bill would be a good start in providing more people access to the polls that won't cost them financially, it still doesn't address the problem of hourly workers.

For some of them it doesn't matter if its a holiday or not - if they aren't working, they aren't getting paid.

In fact this might hurt them more - whereas they might lose a couple hours' wages before, they'll lose a whole day's wages under this bill - as it is possible their employer will be closed due to the voting holiday.

[suegeo]

32. Better place to start: paper ballots

I'll enjoy the day off, but I'll run from any ballot that Republicans will count (or not count, to be more accurate.)

[DU GrovelBot]

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[Paulie]

34. Make the voting holiday Veterans Day

What better way to honor Veterans than to exercise the right to Vote?

[dhinojosa]

36. That's a knee-slappin good idea

Hot-diggity

[ernstbass]

39. Why don't we vote on Sundays like most other countries?

[KissMeKate]

41. exfelons voting will sink this.

people think of felons and have an emotional response- Con jobs are really astute at manipulating that emotional response.

[Bridget Burke]

42. OK. Currently, ex-felons can vote in Illinois.

Is there a campaign to strip them of that right? Have you joined?

Here in Texas, the right is restored two years after getting out of prison or finishing parole/probation.

[Guckert]

44. If we called it Ronald Reagan Day they would back it in a second.

Idiots!!!:puke:

[CWebster]

46. Well now

Now that she has herself to consider, what other issue would she grandstand over?

Ditto for Kerry.

[Imagevision]

54. I too support Hillary on this one-allow the black vote to be counted also

[mudderfudder77]

56. Is that because

13% of African American males are former felons?

[Khaotic]

59. I Signed Sen. Clinton's Call To Action

... and you can too: http://www.friendsofhillary.com/CountEveryVote

I sent her call out to many of my friends, some of which can't stand her, but support election reform. They signed it.

It's high time we did something and reading the quibbling on this board about ex-felons makes me ill.

They paid their due, they should vote.

If you ask me it shouldn't be a choice. If you qualify to vote then you vote, like paying taxes. No choice about it.

We have truent officers rounding up kids that skip school because education is so important. Isn't democracy just as important?

If you're a U.S. citizen of age to vote, have a SSN#, and the government has you on their list as a human being that converts Oxygen into Carbon Dioxide, then your ass is voting. Unless you're incarcerated, committed, or on parole.

For those that don't vote you're treated the same as someone that doesn't pay taxes. Instead of tax-evasion it's election-evasion.

Imagine close to 100% of those eligible to vote actually voting.

Enough to make any Neocon Christian Reich GOP SOB cry.

[lies and propaganda]

61. i would love a voting holiday

its ridiculous to yell at people that they have enough time when something may be open for 12 hours. And polling places get packed to the gills in a college town like where i live. So a national holiday seems like the best thing ever. i cant imagine why any democrat would not want this.