It's a general rule in America that if you get convicted of a felony and are given a sentence that involves time in prison, you don't get to vote from your jail cell. But yesterday, it turns out, a federal appeals court ruled that Washington State's ban on incarcerated felons voting violates the Voting Rights Act because it disenfranchises minority voters.
The ban is contained in Article IV of the Washington Constitution, which bars people convicted of "infamous crime" from voting until their civil rights are restored. "Infamous crime" is defined by reference to incarceration, specifically. As it stands, felons' voting rights cannot be restored until their prison sentences are completed and the terms of any community supervision are met. But were the Supreme Court to uphold the federal court's ruling, that would change in Washington and 47 other states that currently ban felons from voting in given circumstances (Maine and Vermont allow felons in prison to vote). Clearly, that would represent a major shift, and one that a lot of people would find highly objectionable. By contrast, allowing ex-offenders to vote is a position that a lot of people (including myself) find unobjectionable, or generally reasonable. Allowing those still serving out a sentence in jail to do so is a different matter, and I suspect there's going to be plenty of outrage about this decision, both in Washington, and elsewhere, irrespective of the merits of what was argued by those bringing the case-- which, while the court obviously found them compelling, strike me (as they do Washington's Attorney General, Rob McKenna) as questionable....
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