Regulating our Rights

Freedom is everything, but without a degree of regulation, these freedoms that we enjoy can be abused. You could say that regulating our rights promotes security, safety, and integrity of those that exercise their freedoms. These regulations come in the form of preventative and reactionary enforcement. They also come from different levels of enforcement, ranging from national laws to civil laws.

The freedom of speech is crucial, but can be used maliciously to encourage others to rebel and cause anarchy. To keep the right to free speech as free as possible, people are allowed to say what they want, but could face adverse consequences depending on what they say.

The right to bear arms is regulated more strictly than that of speech. There are preventative regulations such as age limits, photo ID verification, and background checks. These are meant to reduce the possibility of someone obtaining a firearm that would use it in a malicious manner, without completely stripping the rights of eligible individuals to bear arms. To further regulate, reactionary laws are imposed to deter such actions. Some argue that there aren't enough firearm regulations, which is another topic best saved for a separate post.

So what does regulating our rights have to do with Texas? Well Texas legislation led to the passing of a law in 2011 that imposed a regulation on our right to vote. This preventative regulation came in the form of voter ID. This comes as added enforcement to the current preventative regulations of age, citizenship, residency, mental competency, and felony convictions. So why is there so much opposition to voter ID that only increases the integrity of the Texas voting system?

The opposition to this Texas voter ID law centers around claims of discriminating against poor people and hourly workers. Policies that disenfranchise eligible voters is a serious concern that deserves proper consideration. Do the Texas Republicans want to increase the integrity of the state's voting system, or suppress a demographic that tends to vote Democratic?

Not all poor Texans are on TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) or SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), but those that are require an ID to prove residency and citizenship. In order to work in Texas, and America for that manner, employers are supposed to comply with the Employment Eligibility Verification (I-9) Form in accordance with the The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 . It requires that an individual for employment present to the employer or the recruiter or referrer for a fee documentation establishing his or her identity and employment authorization as per §274a.2 Verification of identity and employment authorization of Form I-9 Statutes and Regulations. All that gobbledygook means that if poor people and hourly workers had the documentation to establish their identity for benefits and employment, then they have documentation to acquire a poll-accepted ID. Now that doesn't prove that all voting-eligible Texans have poll-accepted IDs. The case often made is that the source documents, such as a replacement birth certificate or social security card, are expensive.  This may be true, but the voter ID law was passed two years ago. How much time do Texans need to comply new regulation?  Penny-pinching for compliance is probably not at the top of the list for Texans though.

What has the government, political parties, and other organizations done to help people comply with the new law? Has anybody bussed ID-less voters to locations so as to acquire poll accepted IDs? The state offers free voting IDs to those that can prove inability to pay for one.  This seems to be a country where groups sprout up to help those in need, but there seems to be none in this case. Instead, we get editorials on how silly the law voter ID law is. The next Texas vote, November 5^th, is a general election on constitutional amendments. Historically, very few voters turn up for this type of election, so the same is expected this year. There is a whole year before the next major election, giving a total of three years for people to get proper IDs, and for people to help others get proper IDs. The actions of the people will determine whether they allow themselves and their fellow Texans to be disenfranchised come election time next year. That is unless Democrats oppose the whole concept of voter ID for the sole purpose of maintaining an increased possibility of voter fraud. After all, the LBJ ballot box 13 incident did work in their favor.

New voters are constantly added to the registry since they actively register. So what about voters that are no longer eligible due to moving or death? Nobody actively unregisters, so what happens? The Texas voter registry is updated every couple of years, so those voters remain in the registry until the update occurs. So personation, somebody voting for another person, could occur without any indication of fraud. But those that have moved on, in either case, are not the only ones susceptible to this fraud. Voter turnout in Texas has not exceeded 60% of registered voters since 1984. That means 40% of registered voters, or roughly 5.6 million Texans as of 2012, routinely chose to not cast their vote. That was and is their freedom to do so, but it also opens them up to have their vote stolen with no way of anyone knowing. How would someone get caught doing this if they didn't have to show a photo ID? Why not make a day of it by finding out who some of the inactive voters are, and driving to multiple polling locations to cast multiple ballots? You want proof that it happens? I want proof that it doesn't happen.

Voter ID does nothing to prevent absentee voting fraud. So that will probably continue to be exploited until new regulations for it are passed by the Texas legislation.  For now, Texans may not have to show ID when ridiculing Governor Perry, but they sure do have to when purchasing firearms and poll voting, as well as the myriad of other actions that require photo ID.