Selma to Montgomery Redux

                                               Montgomery Advertiser, Mickey Welsh, Associated Press

    

I wanted so much to join Rev. Al Sharpton and thousands of others who marched from Selma Alabama to the State Capitol in Montgomery this past week. The idea that 32 States, including the State of Tennessee have enacted Voter ID laws and discriminatory immigration laws flies against everything gained in the 1965 Voter Rights Act and the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Alabama has enacted one the most restrictive voter ID laws and anti – immigrate laws in America. People of color can and are stopped for proof of citizenship for no other reason other than the color of their skin. Many people in rural America especially the elderly do not have the now needed identification to even get the photo ID.

Here in Tennessee an 87 year old woman who had never missed a vote was turned away from getting her Free State ID because she did not have a driver’s license or birth certificate. This is not uncommon. Many poor African Americans from Rural Southern towns were never born in hospitals and never owned an automobile.

The Brennan Center for Justice, estimates up to 5 million Americans will be disenfranchised by these restrictive voter suppression laws. 

http://www.brennancenter.org/content/section/category/voter_id

When you did deep at the root issue of the why for such legislation, a reasonable person can conclude there must have been a voter fraud issue in the past that would generate such time and effort on the part of 32 States Legislatures.

But that was not the case. Minority voters turned out in record numbers in the 2008 election that is true but voter fraud was less than 0.0002% of all of the 2,921,498 votes cast in Minnesota. There were 7 cases of voter impersonation in all of Minnesota and not one conviction was had.

In the Citizens for Election Integrity study conducted by the State of Minnesota, Photo ID was proven to do nothing to stop voter fraud and only voter impersonation would be stopped by the law. The results of the study did not indicate a photo identification requirement would improve election integrity.

http://www.ceimn.org/files/Facts%20about%20Ineligible%20Voting%20and%20Voter%20Fraud%20in%20Minnesota_with%20appendix.pdf

This is the case in the others States that’s enacted Voter ID Laws as well. The amount of voter fraud by individual voters was nil. In every instance of legitimate voter fraud the fraud was perpetrated by Election or State Officials not the general public as portrayed by the Republican led State Assemblies and Senates. 

 Selma-Montgomery March: Martin Luther King, Jr. and his wife, Coretta, lead a five-day march to the Alabama State Capitol in Montgomery in 1965. (Photo Credit: Bettman/Corbis)

The March to Montgomery II was not a symbolic gesture reminiscent of the Selma to Montgomery March led by Dr. King in 1964. No, this march was to show the world States like Alabama are walking on the Constitutional Rights of American Citizens of all races and creeds.

Human Rights Watch reported the affects the Alabama Anti – Immigration Law has on families of immigrants and to US citizens. The denial of basic human rights threatens immigrants to access to everyday necessities and equal protection of the law the report revealed.

http://www.hrw.org/reports/2011/12/14/no-way-live

All Americans want to know the election process is as secure as our borders. There are other was to secure the vote of its citizens without disenfranchising 5 million people and there are other ways to make sure our borders are secure without discriminating against all people of color. 

You can read this and many more articles of interest at www.BorderlessNewsandViews.com