The Constitutional Amendment: Voter Protection or Voter Suppression?

Dear Editor,

The Constitutional Amendment: Voter Protection or Voter Suppression?

In November's election you will be asked "Shall section 1 of article  3 of the constitution, which deals with suffrage, be amended to provide that only a United States citizen age 18 or older who resides in an election district may vote in an election for national, state, or local office or a statewide or local referendum?" Seems like a no-brainer, right? A reasonable proposal you should support. BUT BEWARE,  looks can be deceiving.    

The wording of the amendment makes it appear that (a) a YES vote means you agree that it is necessary to change the constitution in order to prohibit non-citizens from voting and (b) a NO vote means you are in favor of extending the vote to non-citizens. However, these assertions don't hold up under scrutiny.  

Unless you have read the Wisconsin constitution, you are unlikely to know that the  section Republicans want to amend already limits voting to US citizens: it reads, "Every United States citizen 18 or older who is a resident of an election district is a qualified elector (voter)." Existing federal law also prohibits non-citizens from voting. So a NO vote does not mean you are voting to allow non-citizens to vote. It means the constitution does not need to be amended to protect against non-citizen voting. But there are more important reasons for voting NO. This is not an inconsequential change being proposed.     

There is no credible evidence that non-citizens are illegally voting. This amendment, by arousing fears that illegal voting is threatening the integrity of elections, is laying the groundwork for requiring proof of citizenship (certified birth certificate, passport, or naturalization papers) to register to vote or keep your registration current. Locating these documents, or having to replace lost ones, merely create another obstacle to voting for thousands of citizens. Challenges to the validity of documents presented could be used as a tactic to further frustrate would-be voters. And since people don't carry these documents around with them, they would not be able to take advantage of opportunities encountered at community sites where registration drives have been set up.

Even more problematic, raising doubts about the integrity of elections plays into the hands of extremist election outcome deniers. These people see it as their patriotic duty Io work to overturn, by violent means if necessary, the results of rigged elections. Their definition of a rigged election? One that they lost. 

As Rep.Greta Neubauer (D-Racine) has pointed out, by voting NO you are doing more than just voting against the amendment. You are saying NO to Republican legislators who would limit access to the ballot box based on misinformation about the security of elections. You are saying NO to their circumventing the traditional lawmaking process in order to enshrine their political agenda in our state's most important document, the Wisconsin constitution.

Allen Pincus, Barneveld, WI