Supreme Court Rejects Challenge to Wisconsin Voter ID Law

By ADAM LIPTAK MARCH 23, 2015



Voters in Milwaukee in November. Wisconsin's voter ID law has been challenged since it was enacted in 2011.CreditDarren Hauck/Getty Images

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday turned away a challenge to a Wisconsin law that requires prospective voters to provide photo identification before casting their ballots, meaning Wisconsin voters will have to comply with the law unless another court steps in.

The move was a surprise, as the court last year temporarily blocked the law for the November election.

The American Civil Liberties Union responded to Monday’s development by filing an emergency application in the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, in Chicago, urging that court to stop the law from immediately taking effect. The group said a stay was needed to prevent a sudden change while voting was underway in an April 7 general election. Voters will elect judges, one mayor and other local officials.

“Although the Supreme Court has declined to take this case, it previously made clear that states may not impose new requirements for voting in the weeks before Election Day,” Dale Ho, director of the A.C.L.U.’s Voting Rights Project, said in a statement. “The situation is even more compelling here because absentee ballots have already been mailed out for the April election, and early in-person voting has begun.”

“Imposing a new restriction in the midst of an election will disenfranchise voters who have already cast their ballots,” he said. “It is a recipe for disaster.”

The Wisconsin law, one of the strictest in the nation, was enacted in 2011 but had been mostly blocked by various courts. A federal trial judge, for instance, said that it would “deter or prevent a substantial number of the 300,000-plus registered voters who lack ID from voting” and that it would disproportionately affect black and Hispanic voters.

Civil rights groups had hoped the Supreme Court would use the case, Frank v. Walker, No. 14-803, to reconsider its 2008 decision in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, which upheld Indiana’s voter identification law.

But a three-judge panel of the Seventh Circuit allowed the law to go into effect, reasoning that it was similar to one from Indiana. The full Seventh Circuit deadlocked 5 to 5 on a request to rehear the case, drawing a sharp dissent from Judge Richard A. Posner, who had written the 2007 appeals court opinion upholding the Indiana law that was affirmed by the Supreme Court.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/24/us...er-id-law.html