Federal judge may rule today on rejected voter applications

[Judi Lynn]

Posted on Fri, Oct. 22, 2004

Federal judge may rule today on rejected voter applications

BY JAY WEAVER
[e-mail]


A Miami federal judge might decide today whether to allow more than 14,000 Floridians can vote in the upcoming election even though their voter registration applications were not properly filled out.

U.S. District Judge James Lawrence King could issue his decision late this afternoon after hearing arguments from voting rights groups and labor unions that have filed a lawsuit seeking to have the rejected applicants declared eligible for the Nov. 2 general election.

Florida's Secretary of State and election supervisors in Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Orange and Duval counties have urged the judge to dismiss the suit, which was filed last week after the Oct. 4 voter registration deadline.

Thousands of people -- including African-Americans and Hispanics -- say their voter registration forms were illegally rejected because they did not check off boxes for U.S. citizenship, felony status or mental capacity and did not provide an identification number, according to the suit.
They claim that state and county election officials chose not to accept them because ``they have adopted unduly restrictive registration practices and procedures that violate federal and state laws.''
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/9988121.htm
(Free registration is required)

[toddzilla]

1. any info on the judge?

[movonne]

2. I would like to know that too...

[shraby]

3. I googled and found this:

<http://www.uscourts.gov/ttb/april00ttb/ajshonor.html>

[Judi Lynn]

4. Uh, oh. I grabbed a quick article, and it doesn't look good!

Court Finds Felon Disenfranchisement Law Discriminatory
Kelly Cramer
Miami Daily Business Review
12-29-2003


The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ordered a trial for Florida convicts seeking to restore their civil rights, reversing a decision by U.S. District Judge James Lawrence King, who had dismissed the case.

In a Dec. 19 opinion that reviews the history of Sunshine State's constitution, the 11th Circuit said that there is evidence that the state's felon disenfranchisement law discriminated against blacks when it was enacted and that discrimination may persist to this day. Thomas Johnson, et al. v. Governor of the State of Florida, et al.

A racist boast by a white delegate to the 1868 Constitutional Convention that he kept blacks from taking over the state helped convince the federal appeals court that the law violates the U.S. Constitution's equal protection clause.

By a 2-1 vote, the appeals court partially reversed summary judgment in favor of Gov. Jeb Bush, his cabinet and the election supervisors in the state's 67 counties. The class action suit filed by eight ex-felons could affect more than a half-million people currently denied the right to vote.
(snip/...)

http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1071719749211

[napi21]

5. I don't know about the judges history, but I heard that Fl law

usually sides on "voter intent". If that's the case, he will have president to vule in favor of accepting the registrations.