Comment by tzs | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tzs | Hacker News Reader

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You are probably getting down voted because you are assuming that what works in other countries would work in the US. Maybe it could, but it would take a lot of effort which the people who are pushing for voter ID in the US are not willing to put in.

Those countries have robust and long establish national ID systems, and they do go a good job of making sure citizens easily obtain their ID.

The US has no such system.

There are millions of adult citizens without valid government issues photo ID acceptable and who cannot reasonably afford to get it. Before you say that states offer free ID, it is not the cost of the ID itself that is the issue. It is the cost of getting supporting documents.

Often getting copies of the supporting documents requires showing ID. Oops. There are alternate procedures, which often involve hard to find documents, often not digitized or centralized.

The only way to do a voter ID system in the US without disenfranchising a large number of voters is to establish a system similar to other countries with a national ID that is easy for every citizen to obtain and we grandfather in existing citizens by making the new system only required for people who are born after it is instituted.

> There are millions of adult citizens without valid government issues photo ID acceptable and who cannot reasonably afford to get it. Before you say that states offer free ID, it is not the cost of the ID itself that is the issue. It is the cost of getting supporting documents.

To use Sweden as an example, there is no need for supporting documents. When a person here want a passport or national ID, and they don't already have a valid id, all they need is someone else with an valid ID to sign the paper. It can be a coworker, a teacher, a relative, or basically anyone with some form of relation to the person. The same apply for voting, so someone can go and vote as long they have a second person with an ID willing to sign that they are who they claim to be. Not a single paper required and all they need to do is say their name and date of birth.

No birth recipient, no electrical bill, no tax receipt, no money, nor any other paper which is honestly a less secure system that simply having already identified person signing a legally binding paper.

Your society doesn’t exist to punish the people who are part of it.

It's also possible to craft a comprehensive law. My state allows all of the following, even expired versions as long as it expired within the last year, or if the voter is over 65 as long as it was unexpired on their 65th birthday regardless of how long it has been expired now:

1) Driver's license, even expired if expired within the last 2 years

2) State Non-Driver's ID

3) Out of state Driver's License

4) Passport

5) Free Voter ID

6) College / University ID

7) School employee ID

Additionally all the following are valid, without any limitations on expiration as long as they are photo IDs:

1) Military / veterans ID

2) Tribal enrollment ID for Native tribes

3) Any other photo ID issued by any federal or the state's government agencies

In addition to all of that, if you still are unable to produce an ID, you can still vote with a "provisional ballot" and sign an affidavit declaring your inability to obtain an ID. All of the following are valid reasons:

1) Lack of transportation

2) Disability or illness

3) Lack of supporting documentation to obtain an ID (birth certificates etc)

4) Work or school schedule

5) Family responsibilities

6) A lost, stolen or misplaced ID

7) Applied for an ID but haven't received it

8) Other impediment (write in)

9) Religious objection to being photographed

10) Victim of a declared natural disaster within 100 days of the election

All provisional ballots must be counted before the state can certify the vote count and a provisional ballot can only be rejected by unanimous vote of the board of elections commission that the ID exception form was filled out falsely.

That seems a pretty reasonable system to me given how it's pretty much impossible to interact with the state, the federal government, banks or employers without a photo ID these days.

That seems pretty reasonable, as long as #3 on the third list isn't is interpreted reasonably.

For example there are people for whom a birth certificate was issued, but they don't know where it was issued (e.g., their parents were migrant laborers and they don't know what county or even what state the parents where in when their Mom gave birth). At some non-trivial expense they could probably track it down, but getting a certified copy requires ID that they do not have, so they first have to bootstrap using the alternate procedure for getting the birth certificate without ID. That in turn often involves tracking down various scattered records from long ago and maybe getting affidavits from people who knew you as a child.

If your state won't let you use #3 until you've gone to the time and expense to go through all that and still failed to get the birth certificate I'd say that is not reasonable.

If they will, great.

> That seems a pretty reasonable system to me given how it's pretty much impossible to interact with the state, the federal government, banks or employers without a photo ID these days.

You'd probably be surprised at the number of people who are living a cash only life and work in jobs that are off the record. (Many things you might think impossible for such people are possible if they have a friend or relative who act as in intermediary with some non-cash service they need).

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