Felon Voting: Another Troubling Sotomayor Decision
Hans von Spakovsky /
One of the biggest annoyances to the Left in recent years has been the Constitutional right of states to prohibit felons from voting. They have filed lawsuit after lawsuit (unsuccessfully) under the Voting Rights Act trying to overturn these laws. Fortunately, except for the Ninth Circuit (as usual), other circuit courts of appeal have properly recognized the constitutional authority of the states and have also held that the legislative history shows that Congress obviously did not consider such state laws to be subject to the prohibitions in the Voting Rights Act.
The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution specifically recognizes the rights of states to abridge the right to vote “for participation in rebellion, or other crime.” As the Second Circuit recognized in 2006 in Hayden v. Pataki, 449 F.3d 305 (2d Cir. 2006), when it upheld New York’s law prohibiting incarcerated felons from voting, there were specific statements in the House and Senate Judiciary Committee Reports and on the Senate floor explicitly excluding felon disenfranchisement laws from provisions of the Voting Rights Act. In fact, this was so clearly the case that there were several unsuccessful attempts in the 1970’s by some in Congress to amend the VRA to have it apply to such state laws. (more…)