The Pros And Cons Of Voter Identification Laws

For some, voter ID laws have no substantial controversy attached to its name, but for others it has several implications. It can be a heated debate for many whether voter ID laws are necessary ways of preventing voter fraud, or constitutional to the rights of American citizens. Voter ID laws were designed to protect from voter fraud; in actuality they often discriminate, and prevent minorities from voting. As many Texas voters know, it was mandated in the last few years that voters must provide specific forms of identification to be eligible to cast a vote, even if they were already registered voters. Unfortunately, as innocent as handing over your drivers license may seem, it is actually keeping a large number of Texas residents from voting in elections because they don’t have government-issued identification. Many judges have spoken out against voter ID laws, but Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos stands out in particular with her surprising statistics, where “…[she] found that 600,000 registered voters in Texas—4.5 percent of the electorate—lacked a government-issued ID, but the state had issued only 279 new voter IDs by the start of the trial. African-Americans were three times as likely as whites to not have a voter ID and Hispanics twice as likely. The

“…This restrictive and discriminatory law has been twice blocked by federal courts finding it to be a discriminatory poll tax, but it has been twice revived by the Supreme Court. The law remains enforce today, but the struggle for voting rights continues” (demblognews.com, Handley). For all of the setbacks that minorities have faced in Texas history, it is truly disheartening that many people of different backgrounds feel as though the state has succumbed once again to discriminating based on a residents social status or color of