Appeal focuses on Arizona’s controversial proof-of-citizenship requirements, but has national ramifications for voter registration efforts
Washington, DC – While a great deal of attention has been focused recently on the U.S. Supreme Court’s consideration of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA), another vitally important voting rights issue will be argued before the justices next week.
On Monday, March 18, the Court will hear oral arguments in Arizona v Inter Tribal Counsel of Arizona, an appeal of two consolidated cases brought by voting and civil rights organizations. At the center of the case is Arizona’s controversial law mandating that people applying to register to vote provide proof-of-citizenship documentation, a requirement that violates the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).
Congress passed the NVRA in 1993 to make registering to vote accessible, particularly for those traditionally excluded by discriminatory and unfair registration rules. Under this federal law, an individual may register by simply completing a postcard-sized application, called the federal form, and mailing it to the appropriate state election office. By giving citizens across the county a simple, uniform, and convenient way to register, the law helped equalize voting opportunities for all.
However, by enacting Proposition 200 in 2004, Arizona unnecessarily complicated the process by requiring that voter registration applicants mail the additional documents with the federal form. In passing the NVRA, Congress expressly decided not to obligate applicants to include proof of citizenship documents, requiring instead that they affirm, under penalty of perjury, that they are eligible to register and to vote.
Voting rights groups say Arizona’s law creates barriers to Americans becoming registered and violates the NVRA. The first lawsuit was filed by a coalition of groups, including the Inter Tribal Council of Arizona, Inc., the Arizona Advocacy Network, the League of United Latin American Citizens Arizona (LULAC), the League of Women Voters of Arizona, the Hopi Tribe, and State Sen. Steve Gallardo. This case was later merged with a second case brought by Project Vote, Southwest Voter Registration Education Project, Valle Del Sol, Friendly House, Chicanos Por La Causa, Arizona Hispanic Community Forum, Common Cause, and a number of individual plaintiffs. The plaintiffs are represented by the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and MALDEF.
In April 2012, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the NVRA trumps state law on voter registration requirements, and that Arizona must accept the federal registration form without requiring additional documents. Now, Arizona has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Proposition 200 has had profoundly anti-democratic results, stymieing community voter registration drives conducted by organizations like Project Vote. Canvassers cannot easily carry a photocopier with them as they knock on doors or stand outside grocery stores, and applicants do not often walk about with personal documents like birth certificates in hand. This is especially harmful to efforts to engage people of color, who are twice as likely to register through such drives.
In the state’s most populous county, registrations by community organizations shrank by 44 per cent after Proposition 200 was implemented. The state rejected over 30,000 voter registration applications in the two years after implementation.
“States must not be allowed to erect the very sorts of obstacles to voter registration that the NVRA was designed to break down,” says Michael Slater, executive director of Project Vote. “We trust that the Supreme Court will side with the lower courts, and preserve for all citizens the equal registration opportunities intended and mandated by the NVRA.”
Project Vote and partners in the cases will be hosting a Tweetchat about the case on March 15 at 2 PM ET. Hashtag: #NVRA. More information is available here: https://www.projectvote.org/blog/2013/03/nvra-heads-to-supreme-court-join-us-315-2-pm-et-for-a-tweetchat/