HARRISBURG, Pa.
(AP) -- Pennsylvania's divisive voter identification requirement
became the latest of its kind to get pushback from the courts ahead of
Election Day, delivering a hard-fought victory to Democrats who said it
was a ploy to defeat President Barack Obama and other opponents who said
it would prevent the elderly and minorities from voting.
Commonwealth
Court Judge Robert Simpson said in his ruling that he was concerned by
the state's stumbling efforts to create a photo ID that is easily
accessible to voters and that he could not rely on the assurances of
government officials at this late date that every voter would be able to
get a valid ID.
If it stands, it is good news
for Obama's chances in Pennsylvania, one of the nation's biggest
electoral college prizes, unless Republicans and the tea party groups
that backed the law find a way to use it to motivate their supporters
and possibly independents.
Simpson based his
decision on guidelines given to him two weeks ago by the state's high
court to determine whether the state had made photo IDs easily
accessible to voters who needed them. It could easily be the final word
on the law just five weeks before the Nov. 6 election, especially since
Gov. Tom Corbett, who had championed the law, said he was leaning
against appealing to the state Supreme Court.
"This
decision is a big win for voters in Pennsylvania," said Witold J.
Walczak of the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, which
helped challenge the law.
Simpson's ruling
would not stop the law from going into full effect next year, though he
could still decide later to issue a permanent injunction as part of the
ongoing legal challenge to the law's constitutionality.
The
6-month-old law - among the nation's toughest - is one of many that has
passed a Republican-controlled state Legislature since the last
presidential election, and has sparked a divisive debate over voting
rights ahead of the contest between Obama, a Democrat, and Republican
nominee Mitt Romney, for Pennsylvania's 20 electoral votes.
It
was already a political lightning rod when a top state Republican
lawmaker boasted to a GOP dinner in June that the ID requirement "is
going to allow Gov. Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania."
The
law is one of about 20 tougher voter identification laws passed
predominantly by Republican-controlled state Legislatures since the last
presidential election. However, several states' laws are not strict in
their requirement for a photo ID, several others were vetoed by
Democratic governors and still others - such as in Texas and Wisconsin -
were held up by courts.
It's not clear how
the laws could affect the presidential election, or even if they will,
considering that the toughest identification laws are not taking effect
this year in presidential battleground states.
"The
thing I'm concerned about is that it will lead to confusion on Election
Day," said Nathan Persily, who teaches election law at Columbia
University. "There will be spotty enforcement ... and there could be
lines and slow voting as a result."
In
Pennsylvania, election workers will still be allowed to ask voters for a
valid photo ID, but people without it can use a regular voting machine
in the polling place and would not have to cast a provisional ballot or
prove their identity to election officials afterward.
Jon
M. Greenbaum of The Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law said
he believes the Pennsylvania case will set an important principle going
forward, that voter identification laws cannot disenfranchise voters.
Others,
such as Michael J. Pitts, who teaches election law at Indiana
University, said Pennsylvania's decision is distinctive because of the
court's discomfort with changing the voter identification rules so close
to an election.
The plaintiffs included the
Homeless Advocacy Project, the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania
and the Pennsylvania chapter of the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People.
Simpson's
ruling came after listening to two days of testimony about the state's
eleventh-hour efforts to make it easier to get a valid photo ID. He also
heard about long lines and ill-informed clerks at driver's license
centers and identification requirements that made it hard for some
registered voters to get a state-issued photo ID.
Pennsylvania,
traditionally considered a presidential battleground state, is showing a
persistent lead for Obama in independent polls. Pollsters had said
Pennsylvania's identification requirement could mean that fewer people
ended up voting and, in the past, lower turnouts have benefited
Republicans in Pennsylvania.
But Democrats
have used their opposition to the law as a rallying cry, turning it into
a valuable tool to motivate volunteers and campaign contributions while
other opponents of the law, including labor unions, good government
groups, the NAACP, AARP and the League of Women Voters, hold voter
education drives and protest rallies.
The law
was a signature accomplishment of Corbett and Pennsylvania's
Republican-controlled Legislature. Republicans, long suspicious of
ballot-box stuffing in the Democratic bastion of Philadelphia, justified
it as a bulwark against any potential election fraud.
Every
Democratic lawmaker voted against it. Some accused Republicans of using
old-fashioned Jim Crow tactics to steal the White House from Obama.
Other opponents said it would make it harder for young adults,
minorities, the elderly, poor and disabled to vote.
Copyright 2012 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
