Sunday, June 7, 2009

Rare that I am in agreement with ACLU

Groups Drop Lawsuit Against Elections Board
Three free-speech groups have dropped a lawsuit against the state Board of Elections after the General Assembly passed legislation that allows people to wear political clothing to the polls.
The ACLU of Virginia, the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression and The Rutherford Institute sued the State Board of Elections arguing that its ban on clothing, hats, buttons or other paraphernalia that expressly advocates the election or defeat of a candidate or issue inside polling places violates free speech rights. See the story here


Some will remember that I got real upset with this when it came up. I was imagining a mature poll worker being afraid to go up to a young ,energetic, dedicated, hard-headed, voter, and saying"Oh , you have to cover that shirt or leave." If the worker did, I saw two scenarios.
The young voter would leave, and go right to the press and say, "They are trying to suppress the vote." Stories and smears would follow. Investigations and hearings. Fortunately, that did not happen this last election.
The other scenario is ranting, raving, etc, and the worker backing down. While the mature voters all complied, and covered.
I saw problems arising more and more each year.

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