Here's further elaboration on that point:
Unlike citizens in every other advanced democracy—and many other developing ones—Americans don’t have a right to vote. Popular perception notwithstanding, the Constitution provides no explicit guarantee of voting rights. Instead, it outlines a few broad parameters. Article 1, Section 2, stipulates that the House of Representatives “shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States,” while Article 1, Section 4, reserves the conduct of elections to the states. The Constitution does, however, detail the ways in which groups of people cannot be denied the vote. The 15th Amendment says you can’t prevent African American men from voting. The 19th Amendment says you can’t keep women from voting. Nor can you keep citizens of Washington, D.C., (23rd Amendment) or 18-year-olds (26th Amendment) from exercising the franchise. If you can vote for the most “numerous” branch of your state legislature, then you can also vote for U.S. Senate (17th Amendment).There is no proactive, positive language that enforces the ability of citizens to vote. The author woudl like to see some added - an affirmative constitutional right - added to the US Constitution.
These amendments were passed in different circumstances, but they share one quality—they’re statements of negative liberty, establishing whom the government can’t restrict when it comes to voting. Beyond these guidelines, states have wide leeway in how they construct voting systems.
Proponents say that an affirmative constitutional right would, at the very least, force state lawmakers and election administrators to think twice about measures and election procedures that harm voters. “A constitutional amendment for the right to vote is needed to make it explicit,” says Judith Browne Dianis, co-director of the Advancement Project, a civil-rights organization. “Making it explicit will send a signal to state legislatures and courts that any barriers to our democracy must be carefully devised so that they don’t disenfranchise people.” The Supreme Court, she notes, has been happy to defer to states’ laws on voting, even if the result is to keep some people from exercising the franchise. In 2008, the Court upheld Indiana’s voter-identification law, declaring that it wasn’t unconstitutional to require photo identification at the polls because the state had a “valid interest” in deterring fraud. That ruling was made despite Indiana’s inability to produce a single example of in-person voter fraud.A conservative commentator considers the implications of such an amendment. It woudl lead to additional national power over the states
A right-to-vote amendment would raise the standard of constitutional review for voter-identification laws and other measures that deplete the pool of voters. Currently states have to show only a “compelling interest” for their laws to pass muster. An affirmative right to vote would compel courts to apply “strict scrutiny,” the standard used to review laws that operate on the basis of race and other characteristics. The burden would then be on a state like Indiana to prove voter fraud and to show that IDs or other requirements are needed to prevent further problems
Such an amendment would likely result in a substantial expansion of the Justice Department. I'd guess it would look something like the Voting Rights Act, with the feds identifying problematic states and counties and paying them special attention. So...
What limiting principles would there be for such oversight? Is having to wait in line a violation of the right to vote? Are voter-ID laws in violation of such an amendment? Are states with shorter intervals for voter registration in violation? Are felons exempted from this right? If so, is there anything that might strip said right? Bouie brings up several of these as reasons for such a right, but I'm uncertain to what extent he feels we should empower federal authorities to act.
Thanks to the Dish for flagging the story.
