Monday, October 27, 2008

Armies of Lawyers

Slate tells us that they are set to descent across the country for both major parties to challenge ineligible voters -- if the are Republican -- and fight voter suppression -- if the are Democrat:

With an estimated 9 million new voters registered, lawyers on each side will be ghost-busting their election nightmare of choice: Democrats claim Republicans seek to suppress the vote—particularly student and minority votes—through polling-place intimidation, threatening robo calls, and illegal voter-roll purges. Republicans respond—indeed John McCain expressly announced at the final debate—that Democrats are "destroying the fabric of democracy" by signing up Mickey, Minnie, Donald, and Daisy, who will all then vote in coordinated efforts to steal the election.

...

Election litigation is a boom industry, even in a crumbling economy. Hasen recently published a study indicating that the number of lawsuits filed over elections rose from an average of 94 in the four years before the 2000 election to an average of 230 in the six years after. Paradoxically, the best way to inoculate America against the growing pandemic of "vote fraud" allegations from the political right, and the anxiety over widespread voter intimidation and suppression from the left, may be by throwing more lawyers at it. That's why the single most important role for the armies of attorneys working the 2008 election may ultimately just be to be there: to avert the biggest conflicts and bear witness to the small ones. Send in enough lawyers, and you may just ensure that a watched polling place never boils.