Holly New

The potential for voter fraud is outstanding.

A study from the Pew Center for the States, published February 2012, found that “approximately 24 million—one of every eight— voter registrations in the United States are no longer valid or have significant inaccuracies” and “more than 1.8 million deceased individuals are listed as voters.”

This problem even occurs in our very own state, Illinois: “Fourteen of the state’s 102 counties have more registered voters than voting-age residents,” according to an April 2011 Huffington Post article.

There is an obvious problem in the registration department.

With so many opportunities for voter fraud available, shouldn’t we, as a fair society, try to prevent that?

Now, I will be the first to admit that the number of voter fraud cases is small.

According to abcnews.com, a study from the Department of Justice points out that “out of the 197 million votes cast for federal candidates between 2002 and 2005, only 40 voters were indicted for voter fraud.”

But is it fair to ponder the possibility that there are more cases than we know of? I think so. When millions of votes have to be kept track of, there must be a decent system set in place to prevent fraud. I think the easiest way to prevent a number of voter fraud problems is to just prove who you are by showing an ID. Many public libraries require photo IDs just to obtain a library card. For something as important as an election, is an ID too much to ask for?

We all should support a system that can prevent election conspiracies, especially in close elections (most notably the Bush/Gore election in 2000). If a candidate is going to win, let them win fairly, chosen by the people, without interference or deception.

Troy Doetch

Theoretically, voter identification laws are fine. Fraud is bad. Photo ID is the modern standard for proving you are who you say you are. It’s not too crazy to think we should cast our ballots with the same fastidiousness with which we buy our booze. However, these voter laws are a huge bummer because they were enacted quickly, doing a lot less preventing voter fraud and a lot more excluding Americans from a constitutional right.

According to the Brennan Center for Justice, a non-partisan public policy and law institute at the New York University School of Law, in the last two years, 14 states have passed restrictive voting laws that will be in place in next week’s election. Also, 10 states require voters to provide photo ID at the polls.

This sounds fine until you consider (as pointed out by LetMyPeopleVote2012.com) 18 percent of seniors and young voters and 25 percent of African Americans don’t have the ID required. Further, as many as 3.2 million Americans may have more obstacles voting in this year’s election because of new voter identification laws.

To keep this from becoming a breach of the 24th amendment, that pretty little number on not taxing the vote, states are issuing free IDs. To get one, all you need is a ton of other documents..

While obstacles may be necessary to ensure the integrity of the democratic process, that integrity has pretty much never been threatened by voting fraud. As Mother Jones put it, there were 13 credible cases of in-person voter impersonation from 2000 to 2010; in the same time frame, 441 Americans were killed by lightning. .

Theoretically, you can agree with voter identification. But in reality, voter ID laws sacrifice the rights of the youth and African Americans in order to safeguard against a nonexistent problem.