1,000 Republican Students Denied Right to Vote

Generation GOP - Arkansas ^ | Oct. 22, 2002

[Cold Heat]

I think they should enforce the law and prohibit the dems from doing the college thing.(that will kill them) However, once on the rolls and not duplicated, they should let things stand as they are. It is too close and there is no fair remedy.

This is what I decided after some thinking.

[Texas Mom]

Students who have legal residence in another state cannot vote where they go to college.

Not just the state they call home, but even if they consider Arkansas their home state, they have to be registered and vote in their own precinct.

[wingnuts'nbolts]

An even better idea! Voting age 35 and citizen for at least 5 years.

[wingnuts'nbolts]

An even better idea! Voting age 35 and citizen for at least 5 years.

[Cacique]

bookmark bump

[fella]

The students at the University of Arkansas in Fayette-Nam will get to vote but then they're mostly (b)rats.

[Lauratealeaf]

My husband is retired military and we always registered to vote in his home district and then voted absentee. When we bought a home we registered where we lived. Military have to have a permanent home address and should never consider base housing a permanent home address.

We always voted absentee in the state of our permanent home address which happened to be Arkansas. But, when we were living at Fort Drum (during the Clinton administration) there was a group who tried to keep military folks who were actually registered in New York state (and had their permanent home address there) from voting in local, statewide and federal elections. They actually filed suit. It caused a big controversy and was part of the Clinton administration's attempt to take away the ability to be able to vote on military installations. I remember that it was Democrats who were angry that there were so many people who lived at Fort Drum that actually took an interest in voting. They didn't like that even though the people were doing it legally. That is the whole bottom line to this issue too. The Democrats want to be able to vote and have all of their ancestors vote but don't want to give young Republicans the same chance.

[leprechaun9]

I am missing something. If they are currently registered to vote, then that jurisdiction has accepted their qualifications to vote in that election.

I understand the purging of former registrations, but a valid CURRENT registration must be accepted.

Please help me understand what I am missing?

[Sloth]

Actually, if it were up to me, we'd raise the voting age to 35.

While you're at it, lower the max voting age to 55. The elderly are sucking us dry with their entitlements.

[Sloth]

...seems to indicate that it is not possible for students living in a given area in connection with their role as students to establish a new domicile in that location, as long as they remain students.

Ridiculous. If I go right now and sign up for a night class at UALR, does my residency automtically revert to my parents' address?

[mvpel]

Ridiculous. If I go right now and sign up for a night class at UALR, does my residency automtically revert to my parents' address?

I assume that you live in your own home, separate from your parents. That is your domicile. If you sign up for a night class at UALR, then under the law, your domicile is what it was before you became a student, that is, your current domicile. It will remain there even if you move onto campus temporarily. The point is that your domicile doesn't automatically convert to the UALR campus, and cannot, under the law -- not that it converts back to your parents' address.

[mvpel]

The judge determined that the students were in violation of the law by registering to vote at their college address, and that the jurisdiction was in violation of the law when it accepted their qualifications to vote, under the provisions of Arkansas Election Code. The Code specifically excludes students from registering to vote at their temporary school addresses.

[A. Pole]

Simple. They were Republicans.

Or maybe that they are Baptists what violates the separation of church and state.

[sweetliberty]

It is perfectly valid for them to refuse to register anyone to vote in this election at this point because the deadline passed on October 7. Any student that did not register in time and is not registered somewhere else is just out of luck as any of us would be if we were not responsible enough to register on time.

If a student IS registered somewhere else in the state of Arkansas, they have until October 29 to obtain an absentee ballot, so those students have an option and should exercise it.

Where the problem is is with those students who changed their registration from their previous location and have been purged from the rolls in the previous residence AND with those students who never registered in a previous location. These students were apparently registered only in Clark County and some had even voted previously there and some are even from that county. As I understand it, this decision was made to purge their names from the rolls AFTER the deadline to register anywhere else, assuming they have what could be considered a legal residence outside the county, which means that unless the decision is overturned they will not be allowed to vote even though they were originally registered in plenty of time.

[mvpel]

Well I went to Purdue and the student body outnumbered the population of West Lafayette. Nobody seemed to care.

Maybe you weren't asking the right people. But the fact is, Indiana law is different than Arkansas law in this respect - Indiana only requires that you reside in the precinct for at least 30 days, under IC §3-7-13-1(3), and has no exclusion for students or other temporary residents.

On the other hand, anyone presently in jail or otherwise lawfully detained, or anyone who's been convicted of and imprisoned for a crime regardless of whether or not it was a felony, is not eligible to register and vote under §3-7-13-4, unlike in some other states.

Would there be a big uproar if there was a prison voter registration drive that an Indiana judge ruled illegal? I doubt it. The law is the law, and if the legislators don't like it, they should just introduce a bill to change it.

I agree that there may be some special cases where a student legitimately can claim his domicile at the college address, and those should be addressed in court. I also agree that the students should be allowed to re-register at their proper domicile despite the deadlines.

But the bottom line is that someone really fouled up by registering them without consulting the law first.

[Boiler Plate]

I got an IN drivers license and licensed my car there because insurance was a tenth of what it was in MD. There were no questions after that point.

I spent more time in IN than MD and I paid for my own tuition so why wouldn't I want to register there? I really didn't care what happened in MD as much as I did in IN.

I do agree that if that was the law in AR then someone goofed, however I still disagree with it.

[Anticommie]

1,000 Republican Students Denied Right to Vote

Clinton's curse.

[think it through]

Governor Huckabee signed Act 1471 of 1999 on 4-15-99. This Act amended Arkansas 7-5-201 (b)(6), which governs residency requirements for voter qualifications.

OBU lies within Arkadelphia Ward 1, which currently has 800 registered voters with the OBU zip & 579 with the Arkadelphia zip. OBU students can choose local leadership for legal residents of Arkadelphia. This should give you pause, no matter what your political affiliation.

(HSU lies within Arkadelphia Ward 3, and has 112 registered voters with the HSU zip & 747 voters with the Arkadelphia zip.)

[think it through]

Don't quit now...you seemed to be one of few voices of reason. mvpel's submission-the law which was signed by Governor Huckabee on 4/15/99-is the legal basis for this entire debacle. Just because no one had the courage to challenge the OBU/HSU student voters who reside in campus housing before now, does not mean they were operating within the law. The aggressive registration drive was undertaken by people who knew the law and felt safe in disregarding it. Mr. Curry's suit is absolutely justified. The only problem may be in the timing.

[think it through]

RE: 18 & 27, it does sound like this young man may be a legal resident, hence a legal voter. I hope that the wholesale disrespect for this law that some have promoted does not disenfranchise Mr. Copeland, or any true residents. RE: 31, it is not true that all other AR college students are allowed to register and vote where they attend school. Also, Judge Thomas is protecting "the votes of lawful residents" of Arkadelphia Wards 1 & 3 from hundreds of registered voters who are currently "not properly qualified to vote". I think we are all aware that Governor Huckabee's daughter attends Ouachita. Shame on her, especially, for not respecting this law that her father signed. If you do not like a law, work to change it...don't just decide that you have the right to ignore it. RE: 48 & 71, There have been problems in previous years-the problems have just not received this level of publicity. As we can all see, this issue is charged with emotion and partisan divisiveness. It is a shame that this situation has been allowed to reach this level of controversy. Hopefully, this will finally be settled. It would be the answer to many prayers to have a clear mandate that all would respect...this litigation could be a good thing?