As the presidential election season cranks up, so, it seems, do efforts to suppress voter turnout.

It's an old and disturbing pattern by certain elements of the Republican Party (having learned from Democrats in past eras) and one very much on display again.

Five states passed laws in 2011 requiring voter identification at the polls. Such laws usually require prospective voters to present some sort of government issued photo ID to poll workers before they are allowed to cast ballots. They generally work to suppress turnout in poor minority communities among college students and urban residents, all groups considered to be reliable Democratic voters. Keeping such voters away from the polls appears to be the goal of Republican-dominated legislatures that are the modern champions of voter ID laws.

Poor blacks and Latinos are less likely to drive and therefore less likely to have driver's licenses, the most common form of government identification.

The laws also impact the very young and big-city dwellers, who frequently don't drive either.

Elderly voters are particularly hard-hit. Not only are they less likely to have driver's licenses, many lack valid birth certificates.

A 93-year-old cleaning lady from Tennessee was unable to obtain a voter ID in that state because she was delivered by a midwife in Alabama in 1918 and never received an official birth certificate.

Another elderly Tennessean was initially denied a voter ID when her birth certificate with her maiden name did not match her married name and she was unable to locate her decades old marriage license. And a World War II veteran did not get his voter ID because he was unable to stand in the long line at Tennessee's DMV office where voter IDs were issued.

Tennessee's voter ID law takes effect Jan. 1, just in time for the presidential election.

Despite their discriminatory impact, voter ID laws are not considered unconstitutional. Even though justices acknowledged there was zero evidence of in-person voter fraud in Indiana's entire history, the U.S. Supreme Court in 2008 approved an Indiana voter identification law. In a 6-3 decision, the high court ruled that such laws were not overly burdensome and that their stated goal, to reduce election fraud, was a legitimate state function.

Nonetheless, under the Voting Rights Act of 1965, all or parts of 16 states that have historically discriminated against minority voters must submit changes to their voting laws, including voter ID mandates, to the U.S. Justice Department for final approval.

Earlier this month the department rejected a South Carolina voter ID law after concluding it would make it more difficult for minorities to vote. The department is reviewing a similar law from Texas.

Unlike South Carolina and Texas, Tennessee is not required to obtain pre-clearance from the Justice Department for its voting law change. Critics of voter ID in that state say they intend to sue.

More intervention is needed and the Obama administration has made it clear it may be coming. In a recent speech, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder vowed to fight laws that reduce access to voters. "Honoring our democracy demands that we remove any and all barriers to voting," Holder said. And those barriers need to come down before Americans go to the polls in 2012.

The Bee's past stands

"The U.S. Supreme Court's 6-3 ruling on Indiana's voter ID law will rank as among the court's worst – up there with Plessy v. Ferguson, the 1896 ruling allowing forced separation of the races. It wasn't overturned until 1954. Here's hoping it doesn't take 58 years to overturn Monday's misguided decision."

– May 1, 2008

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