Spokane7
49°
January 6, 2010 in City
Wash. to appeal felon vote ruling to Supreme Court
OLYMPIA — Attorney General Rob McKenna and Secretary of State Sam Reed say they will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn an appellate court’s decision that would give Washington state felons in prison and on community supervision the right to vote.
McKenna and Reed announced their decision Wednesday. The appeal has to be filed with the court by April, and the state will seek a stay on felony inmates’ ability to vote until the case is resolved.
Tuesday’s 2-1 ruling by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the 2000 ruling of a district judge in Spokane. The appeals court says Washington state’s felon disenfranchisement law violates the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
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Couple acquitted of caging 2 boys 
empyrius on January 06 at 4:54 p.m.
No incarceration without representation!
The court ruling is an excellent read all, here is the link if any care (which you should), http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2010/01/05/06-35669.pdf; how dare McKenna appeal this ruling, I bet he is a white guy (well, I am white too, but not a racist :))!
Here is a tidbit from Farrakhan v. Gregoire:
“Plaintiffs have demonstrated that racial minorities are overrepresented in the felon population based upon factors that cannot be explained by non-racial reasons. Given that uncontroverted showing, in the words of the district court, there can be “no doubt that members of racial minorities have experienced discrimination in Washington’s criminal justice system.” In the face of this showing, all Defendants did was question the credibility of Plaintiffs’ experts without “rais[ing] a genuine issue of material fact regarding” the ultimate effect of Washington’s felon disenfranchisement law. They have “not offer[ed] any fact-based or expert-based refutation,” that challenges the conclusions reached by Plaintiffs’ experts. Section 2 of the VRA (Voting Rights Act) demands that such racial discrimination not spread to the ballot box. Thus, based on the uncontroverted record, Plaintiffs are entitled to summary judgment.”
Amen
Liberty_Bell on January 06 at 5:42 p.m.
Read the Dissent!
Were equal opportunity under the “rule of law.”
McKeowan in Dissent
“In granting summary judgement to plaintiffs, the majority has charted territory that none of our sister Circuts has dared to explore. The First, Second and Eleventh have determined that vote denial challanges to felon disenfranchisement laws are not cognizable under the Voter Right’s Act…”
Would the Sheriff of Selma Alabama, also be allowed to vote, after Martin Luther King Marched to Montgomery for the Voter Right’s Act in 1965, 100 years to the day that Lincoln’s Troops Marched thru Selma and Montgomery too?
I suppose Lincoln’s Chief Justice, in Mobile Alabama on the 3rd of June 1865, would have allowed all the criminals to vote too?
AXe on January 06 at 6:10 p.m.
Look what we got when Gregoire the former ATG was elected. Please dont make the same mistake w/McKenna. I dont want my kids wearing Gestapo uniforms.
If your taxed then you should have a voice in how its spent.
Liberty_Bell on January 06 at 6:26 p.m.
A.K.A. the 9th Circus, the most overuled court in the Nations History!
AMENDMENT XIII
Passed by Congress January 31, 1865. Ratified December 6, 1865.
Section 1.
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
“except as a punishment of crime?”
AMENDMENT XV
Passed by Congress February 26, 1869. Ratified February 3, 1870.
Section 1.
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude—
“or previous condition of servitude?”
empyrius on January 06 at 6:51 p.m.
Liberty_Bell is it? Is that you LoyalLancer (you are quite the feisty one!!!)?
Anyways, Yes I did read the dissenting opinion, yet I agree with the majority’s opinion that minority groups in Washington State are quite severely affected by policing tactics that result in the inordinate numbers of Hispanics, Native Americans, and blacks serving time. Also, the quite significant fines and probation bags of tricks that must be satiated before re-acquiring the right to vote after jail/prison release is even far more pernicious than the poll taxes that used to be used to disfranchise blacks.
Given the extreme preponderance of the white race over other races in this state social justice demands that all minorities have the right of voting, they have to have a voice, if any type of recognizable “justice” is to be possible. And given that such tremendous numbers of minorities are over-represented in our prison population, those prisoners must have the basic human right to vote!
No incarceration without representation!
Amen
Liberty_Bell on January 06 at 7:09 p.m.
“This is a court of law, young man, not a court of justice.”
Mr. Justice Holmes, Jr.
empyrius on January 06 at 8:44 p.m.
Nice list of quotes AXe.
So your quote means that our laws reflect not justice LoyalLancer? I agree with you 100%!
Peace
Liberty_Bell on January 06 at 9:03 p.m.
And more real viewpoints?
A split Ninth Circuit decision that invalidated a Washington law banning incarcerated felons from voting drew much attention yesterday and prompted predictions that it would be reheard en banc or by the Supreme Court. The Associated Press (via the Washington Post) reports on the decision and reactions to it. The Seattle Times confirms that the State of Washington will appeal the ruling. If the case doesn’t go en banc at the Ninth Circuit, Kent Scheidegger of Crime & Consequences says it will be a “slam-dunk for Supreme Court review.” Doug Berman at Sentencing Law and Policy agrees, adding that “[a]mong interesting story lines to watch as this case goes forward is whether and how the Solicitor General of the United States might get involved.”
empyrius on January 06 at 9:23 p.m.
“And more real viewpoints”, as opposed to what? Unreal viewpoints? So if a viewpoint is “unreal” then it does not exist: all viewpoints thus far obviously exist (this is, it is impossible to ponder viewpoints that do not exist!!!) . . .
So are you trying to saw judically wrought laws will in the end thwart justice, again, of that LoyalLancer I have no doubt.
But at least Lady Justice smiles today!
Peace
Liberty_Bell on January 06 at 9:38 p.m.
Who’s this LoyalLancer you kep refeering to, a 1031 like kind exchange with Lancelot or somthing?
Where exactly do you make the connection, that voting is a basic human right?
Does that make a crime, a basic human right too?
The first requirement of a sound body of law is, that it should correspond with the actual feelings and demands of the community, whether right or wrong. If people would gratify the passion of revenge outside of the law, if the law did not help them, the law has no choice but to satisfy the craving itself, and thus avoid the greater evil of private [42] retribution. At the same time, this passion is not one which we encourage, either as private individuals or as lawmakers. Moreover, it does not cover the whole ground. There are crimes which do not excite it, and we should naturally expect that the most important purposes of punishment would be coextensive with the whole field of its application. It remains to be discovered whether such a general purpose exists, and if so what it is. Different theories still divide opinion upon the subject.
It has been thought that the purpose of punishment is to reform the criminal; that it is to deter the criminal and others from committing similar crimes; and that it is retribution. Few would now maintain that the first of these purposes was the only one. If it were, every prisoner should be released as soon as it appears clear that he will never repeat his offence, and if he is incurable he should not be punished at all. Of course it would be hard to reconcile the punishment of death with this doctrine.
The main struggle lies between the other two. On the one side is the notion that there is a mystic bond between wrong and punishment; on the other, that the infliction of pain is only a means to an end. Hegel, one of the great expounders of the former view, puts it, in his quasi mathematical form, that, wrong being the negation of right, punishment is the negation of that negation, or retribution. Thus the punishment must be equal, in the sense of proportionate to the crime, because its only function is to destroy it. Others, without this logical apparatus, are content to rely upon a felt necessity that suffering should follow wrong-doing.
empyrius on January 06 at 10:13 p.m.
Oooo, you just sound like this lady that used to blog over at Krem until they ruined their blogging format. My bad Liberty_Bell.
While I certainly do appreciate Hegel’s ideal of an eternally spiritual reality that ever is in a dialectical progression with finite physicality, introducing ghosts and goblins aids not in finding justice in our society, in other words, let us leave unsubstantiated metaphysical conjecture out of men making laws.
Let us also leave “feelings” out of law-making and stick to the facts!
Our society long ago gave up upon the ideal of rehabilitating people who have committed a crime, and now we simply punish people, hence we have the largest prison population of any nation on this planet. There are many reasons for this which I shall not go into at this time.
But the issue at hand is why are blacks and Hispanics so massively over-represented in our prison/jail populations? The simplified answer is that centuries of overt racism has led to the state of affairs as they are today, and the only hope these minority populations will have to combat this systemic injustice is to provide the minority populations with the only tool our society provides people (outside of having a whole lot of money and buying “justice”), and that is the ability to vote.
Yet, even the right to vote will do little until we as a society provide education and opportunity for our at-risk populations, but this also will not happen anytime soon . . .
So we must allow our disfranchised sisters and brothers with at least the opportunity to be heard!
Peace
Censored on January 06 at 11:38 p.m.
Again I must say WOW.. What most of you fail to understand is the stripping of rights of individuals. I can honestly say everyone posting here is a criminal. You may not have been caught but I can assure you that you have all commited some form of infraction or other. The question is, if you had been caught do you feel your right to vote should be revoked? Should you be “Taxed” in addition to your time spent and legal obligation(s) to the people and state?
The responses above just make me certain I call this paper by the correct name, the socialist review.
Did you know that as a child, if you are convicted of a felony you LOSE YOUR RIGHT TO VOTE as well as your right to BEAR ARMS.
Did you know the so called justice system tells kids it all goes away when you turn 18. Did you know this is a line of BS.
Well you do now.
I pay my share of taxes which are plenty. I have been considered a second class citizen for the past 20yrs. I have less rights than an immigrant. Yet I was only 14.
So before people like Liberty_Lady spout out you should learn to research what you are really talking about before you attempt to commit yet another offense of plagiarism. Just found out you broke the law didnt you! Say good bye to your voting rights then I suppose as your wrong constitutes a punishment far in excess of your supossed crime.
Liberty_Bell on January 07 at 7:22 a.m.
Offense of Plagiarism Censored?
No I don’t know what I’m talking about and that Amendment to the Bill of Rights, that took care of another voting issue, by example?
Take for instance Amendment XIX?
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denioed or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
Justice Hunt adopted the argument of the prosecution that the statute spoke of knowing one had voted, not of knowing about the illegality of one’s vote. By this reasoning, Hunt concluded that there was no fact for the jury to decide. According to Hunt, Susan B. Anthony had no right to vote, yet she knowingly voted; she must pay the penalty of the crime. “Ignorance of the law excuses no one,” Hunt wrote.
“Never was a finer canvas presented to work on than our countrymen. All of them engaged in agriculture or the pursuits of honest industry, independant in their circumstances, enlightnedas to their rights, and firm in their habits of order & obedience to the laws. This I hope will be the age of experiments in government, and that their basis will be founded in principals of honesty, not mere force. We have seen no instance of this since the days of the Roman republic, not do we read of any before that.”
Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, Monticello, 1796
Infractions, misdimeanors, and felony’s are three types of crime Censored? You only loose your voting right, by conviction with which type?