Posted on 09/06/2002 7:40:28 PM PDT by GeneD
WASHINGTON, Sept. 6 — House and Senate negotiators said today that efforts to pass a bill that would clean up the nation's voting procedures were falling apart as partisan disagreements grew with the approach of the fall elections.
Large bipartisan majorities of the House and the Senate voted for different versions of the legislation, intended to prevent ballot disputes like those that bedeviled the 2000 presidential election. Among other things, the bills would provide money to help states buy new voting machines.
Senator Christopher S. Bond, Republican of Missouri, an architect of the Senate measure, said the outlook for enactment of a bill this year had become exceedingly bleak.
Mr. Bond said that in April senators of both parties supported a bill that would "make it easier to vote and tougher to cheat." Now, he said: "Democrats want to make it easier to vote and easier to cheat."
"That's a recipe for total failure," he said.
Democrats said Republicans were blocking a compromise. Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut, the principal author of the Senate bill, said the latest proposals from House Republicans would make it harder for people to vote and would "do real damage to protections for the disabled."
Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky, one of the Senate negotiators, said: "It looks like the bill is dead. I hope that's not the way it ends up, but that's the way it looks at the moment."
In an interview tonight, Mr. McConnell said: "The Senate Democratic majority is trying to undo all of the very difficult compromises that we reached prior to passing the Senate bill, which was so skillfully put together that only one person voted against it. They are trying to achieve in conference what they could not achieve on the Senate floor."
Another negotiator, Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, said he remained hopeful that lawmakers could reach a compromise before adjourning for the year.
"Right now there's a lot of posturing as each side tries to maximize its position," Mr. Schumer said. "But this legislation is too important, substantively and politically, for either party to let it fail."
The House passed the bill by a vote of 362 to 63 last December. The Senate approved its version, 99 to 1, in April.
Republicans said today that Senate Democrats were backing away from a provision of the Senate bill that would establish identification requirements for certain first-time voters who had registered by mail. Under the Senate bill, such voters would have to present a photo identification, a utility bill, a bank statement, a paycheck or a government document showing name and address.
House Republicans said that Senate Democrats were trying to revive a proposal, discarded earlier in the Senate, that would allow new voters to confirm their identities by simply signing a form at the polls. Republicans said this proposal would rip a large hole in provisions intended to prevent fraud.
Senator Bond had insisted on the antifraud provisions. As a symbol of problems in his state, Senator Bond often invoked the name of Ritzy Mekler, a dog that was registered to vote in St. Louis. Mr. Bond asserted that there was widespread vote fraud in St. Louis on election night in 2000.
But several Democrats said House Republicans were now seeking identification requirements more extensive and more onerous than those in the Senate bill. Democrats said the proposed requirements could discourage participation by blacks and Hispanic Americans.
Told of the Republicans' concerns, Senator Dodd said he was still committed to the antifraud provisions of the Senate bill. But he said some of the House Republican proposals could raise "significant new barriers" to people wanting to vote. One of the proposals, he said, would require anyone registering to vote to produce either a driver's license or a Social Security number.
Lloyd J. Leonard, legislative director of the League of Women Voters of the United States, said, "The prospects for adoption of an election reform bill are getting worse every day."
Wade J. Henderson, executive director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, a coalition of 180 civil rights groups, said: "Some in the House Republican leadership would prefer that this bill not emerge from the conference committee, and they are attempting to smother it. Without a stronger showing of support from the public, they may succeed."
Mr. Henderson said that some conservative Republicans saw the bill as "empowering an angry constituency of blacks and Latinos who could tip the balance of power" toward Democrats.
Democrats said they believed that the chief author of the House bill, Representative Bob Ney, Republican of Ohio, was negotiating in good faith. They also said they had been assured that the speaker, J. Dennis Hastert of Illinois, wanted a bill passed this year.
But Mr. Leonard of the League of Women Voters said he believed that "the House Republican leadership is blocking election reform."
The House and Senate bills set minimum federal standards for election and voting procedures, which now vary widely by state and county.
Both bills require states to maintain computerized statewide lists of registered voters. Under the Senate bill, voters must have some way to verify their selections, to change their ballots and to correct errors, and voting places must be accessible to people with disabilities. The House bill would establish similar requirements for new voting systems.
Republicans and Democrats have significant disagreements over how to enforce the new standards. Republicans want to give most of the responsibility to the Justice Department. Democrats do not want to rely entirely on the department, but say that individuals and civil rights groups should be able to file suit to halt violations.
Nonetheless, it is amazing how some states treat the issue so casually. In California, they never ask for ID, either at registration or when casting a ballot. To get a library card you need to show ID; there should be at least as strict a requirement for voting.
With all due respect, I would assert no issue can be a winner if the voting is rigged. That, of course, is the point of achieving true election reform. Democrats would never have taken over California without massive illegal immigration and vote fraud. They will do it everywhere else unless serious improvements in registration and voting are made.
Democrats don't need to win fairly and they know it. They will simply cheat. If they had properly instructed a few more ineligible morons to mark a ballot correctly, they would have stolen the presidency in 2000.
The Democrats run California. The Republicans run the library.
Capiche?
I wish it were the other way around.
We'd get a much spicier collection of books and magazines in the libarires! (Just kidding).
Top of the box.
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