Voter citizenship?

Voting is a right. Buying beer is a privilege, as are all your other examples.

Leaving and entering America as an American citizen (also a right) required my birth certificate as proof of my American citizenship to obtain a passport for those travels.

Since voting is a right shouldn't we require that proof be required in order to insure that nobody is infringing on that right? Shouldn't the requirement to vote be the same as the requirement to get a free Vegas buffet voucher?

Don't bring facts to an argument!

SHE'S GUILTY, GUILTY,GUILTY!

billryan, let me ask the question that no one seems to want to ask or answer. Why would you be against showing ID to vote? And please don't tell me about folks who don't have an ID. That is soooo 18th century. I would venture to say that there are any number of government bureaucrats who would hand walk an ID to some senior stuck in his hideaway apartment.

So why would anyone be against voter IDs?

DonDiego is not clear exactly how the itemized purchases are classified as a "privilege".
But:
__If flying on a passenger aircraft is a privilege, it is a privilege for US citizens and non-citizens alike.
__If using a credit card is a privilege, it is a privilege for US citizens and non-citizens alike.
__If purchasing gasoline is a privilege, it is a privilege for US citizens and non-citizens alike. [DonDiego has never been asked for his ID to purchase gasoline.]
__If purchasing a six-pack of beer is a privilege, it is a privilege for US citizens and non-citizens alike.

The issue of this thread is that voting in the United States is a right only for US citizens.
The question to be resolved is how to allow US citizens to vote and prevent non-US citizens from voting.

Requiting a prospective voter to identify himself as a citizen seems a reasonable answer to the question.

Umm, . . . DonDiego supposes as a practical matter those who oppose a voter identifying himself as a citizen are those who opine they would somehow benefit by the votes cast by the non-citizen.

And besides, the Constitution is so old; the Founding Fathers are just old sticks-in-the-mud.
And besides, it's so difficult to amend the Constitution; it's much easier to just ignore it when it's inconvenient to abide by it.

Ummm....court rulings are not based upon what "DonDiego supposses". They are based upon the most constituional remedy from the two sides that bring those cases to court.

For example, in Wisconsin and North Carolina courts determined that voter id laws in those states purposefully disenfranchised thousands of voters in the name of unfounded cases of voter fraud. And since DonDiego is so affectionate of the Constitution I'm sure he respects the conclusions of these Constitutionally defined institutions.

Washing ton Post: court rulings show Republicans can only win by gaming the system.


"The Wisconsin experience demonstrates that a preoccupation with mostly phantom election fraud leads to real incidents of disenfranchisement, which undermine rather than enhance confidence in elections, particularly in minority communities. "

And in North carolina....
“The new provisions target African Americans with almost surgical precision” and “impose cures for problems that did not exist,” Judge Diana Gribbon Motz wrote for the panel. “Thus the asserted justifications cannot and do not conceal the State’s true motivation.”

Come now. Everybody knows the fate of the Republic should be decided on public forums, not the courts. Just because one can't tell the difference between voting and buying a six pack doesn't mean they don't have the right to scream about the injustice of it all. It's the beauty of America.

Judge gnibon was nominated by bill clinton, whose wife will benefit from this decision. She should have recused herself from the case