February 20, 2005
Confusing Rules Deny Vote to Ex-Felons, Study Says
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
WASHINGTON, Feb. 19 - An estimated 1.5 million former convicts are unable to vote in 14 states around the country because of state policies that make it cumbersome, confusing and difficult for them to return to voter rolls after completing their sentences, according to a new study.
Fewer than 3 percent of felons in those states have managed to register to vote after finishing their sentences, according to the study released Wednesday by the Sentencing Project, a nonprofit research group that favors more liberal sentencing policies for criminals.
In Mississippi, for instance, just 107 of more than 82,000 felons have had their voting rights restored since 1992 after completing their sentences, the study found, and in Nebraska, the tally was 343 of more than 44,000.
The question of whether and how former convicts should be allowed to vote has generated a growing nationwide debate in recent months.
The issue became contentious in Florida in the 2000 election and again last year because of accusations that felons, many of them members of minority groups, were effectively being blocked from re-registering, while some Republicans in Washington State asserted that felons were voting illegally in last year's close race for governor.
The Supreme Court declined last year to consider differing interpretations from two appellate courts on the power of states to strip felons of the right to vote. Legislators in some states have pushed to loosen restrictions on registering felons, but others have advocated expanding the types of crimes that would make an offender ineligible to vote.
At the federal level, Democrats in the Senate and House, including Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Barbara Boxer of California, introduced legislation this week that addresses the issue. Among a host of other proposals for ensuring that "every vote is counted," the legislation seeks to restore voting rights "for felons who have repaid their debt to society" and would require states to end the practice of denying voting rights to felons who have completed their prison terms, parole or probation, the sponsors said.
The Sentencing Project said its study was the first to survey how frequently felons were denied voting rights in states with restrictive policies. It examined 14 states that do not automatically restore voting rights to felons after they complete their sentences. Those states are Alabama, Arizona, Delaware, Florida, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, Tennessee, Virginia, Washington and Wyoming.
The study found that Florida, with 48,000 felons returned to voting ranks, was the only state where a significant number had their voting rights restored, but only after extended court battles there.
The report blamed long and confusing waiting periods before felons can seek voting eligibility, inadequate data in state records systems, and arbitrary standards. Some states, like Florida and Kentucky, employ "character tests" that allow state officials to ask felons about their drinking habits or to require them to submit letters of reference in applying for voting rights, the report said.
"What we found is that the procedures in many states for restoring felons' voting rights are so little used and so cumbersome that the possibility of getting restored voting rights for many of these people is just illusory," Marc Mauer, the assistant director of the Sentencing Project, said in an interview.
Several officials involved in state voting procedures did not dispute the study's findings but said they were taking steps to make it easier for felons to register when allowed by state law.
Meredith Imwalle, a spokeswoman for the National Association of Secretaries of State, said a continuing overhaul of state voting databases should help to ease the problem by linking voter rolls in many states to criminal and corrections records.
In Mississippi, a state singled out by the Sentencing Project, a felon guilty of murder, rape or a number of other crimes that result in disenfranchisement must appeal to the governor or the Legislature to regain the right to vote.
"I would say that it is rare for that to happen, as the numbers in this study seem to reflect, so it may in fact be easier for a felon to regain the right to vote in other states," said David Blount, a spokesman for the Mississippi secretary of state's office.
But Mr. Blount said Mississippi, like some other
states, was limited in its options because it would take an amendment to the
State Constitution to change the procedure.