In 1790,  who was permitted to vote was limited to white male property owners – a hold over from English Law. 1865 saw the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to be followed shortly thereafter by the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Still, the vote was the purview of men only.In 1870, the Fifteenth Amendment was passed, affording all citizens the right to vote. That right “….. shall not be abridged or denied by the United States or by any stateon account of race, color or previous condition of servitude ..”.  In 1890, Wyoming is the first state to grant full suffrage rights to women. New York will follow in 1917. Full suffrage for women will be granted by the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. So, a landmark decision here and a landmark Amendment finally affording everyone the right to vote.

Then there was, and is, the continuing undercurrent of Jim Crow laws which targeted Blacks primarily and the poor, black and white,  and others – particularly in the   South – making it near impossible to actually cast a vote. It will not be until 1964, with the passage of the Twenty-fourth Amendment that “… the right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President, Vice-President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax..”.   Keep that thought in mind.

And that is pretty much where things stood – protections for women, minorities, the poor, blacks and other minorities – all granted by federal law and Constitutional Amendment guaranteeing all the right to vote. Not a privilege but a RIGHT.Yes, that’s the way things were – up until 2010. And then it began.

For whatever twisted reason – and I hold that fundamental political  ignorance flavored with not a little bit of racism – the mid term election took a serious hard right turn. I mean  a hard, far and beyond rationale thinking turn to the right and the campaign to basically eliminate the federal government and return ALL governing to the states took off. Promoted by the Tea Party extremists, backed and funded by a select few multi-billionaires and supported by the most singularly obstructionist House of Representatives in history, we were beginning to see matters of government and its functioning grind into a state of chaos.Shortly after the 2010 election, the Minority Leader in the Senate proclaimed at a press conference, that the sole and singular agenda for the GOP was to make sure that the Obama Administration was destined to be a one term administration. That single  event  irrevocably set  the tone for the GOP the next  two years.What followed was calculated, orchestrated obstructionism the likes of which this country has never seen before . Basic legislation which earlier the Republican members not only supported but had, in some cases, actually introduced was now anathema. And anything that came from the White House through the Senate was doa in the House – usually announced by the Speaker before it even came to a vote in the Senate.

Now we are in an election and, working up to this year, there  is raised a new tide in the picture – a “red tide”  if you will. An insidious,  well orchestrated plan to make voting more difficult  for millions of people. Under the guise of wanting to eliminate voter fraud, several states – all with Republican governors and Republican controlled legislatures – introduced and passed laws which would de facto keep people from voting – from exercising that RIGHT under the Constitution.

As noted in a recent article in the Philadelphia Inquirer quoting a  nationwide analysis of nearly 2,000 allegations of voter fraud spanning more than a decade, the findings were that in person voter fraud was virtually nonexistent ( Carnegie-Knight investigative study ). Even in the Court Petition  in Pennsylvania, the defendant ( State  of Pennsylvania ) stipulated that while they had found no evidence of voter fraud, they felt compelled to pass a law to prevent it. What was clearly a partisan piece of legislation, it was  geared to significantly reducing the number of democrats and independents at the polls. Even the Pennsylvania House Leader, Mike Turzai – ( R – PA 28th ) noted in a speech touting the accomplishment of the GOP in Pennsylvania,  that they had passed the Voter ID Law  thus assuring Pennsylvania going to Mitt Romney, the GOP presidential candidate. Not only is this a clear and directed effort to keep traditionally democratic groups from voting, the GOP is actually bragging about it. And while the courts seem  to favor these laws ( at least those with Republican judges ), on the surface  requiring an ID to vote does not seem to be  too objectionable. The devil is in the detail of the specific requirements for that ID and the accompanying so called purging of voter rosters that raises the specter of Jim Crow all over again. Remember that rule about poll taxes  which was declared illegal by the twenty-fourth Amendment. One needs to ask the question about this current wave of anti- voter legislation. Many people, especially seniors and seniors living in rural areas, must find a way to travel to often distant locations and file and pay for applications for new documents, which may or may not be easily retrievable. Is this not clearly  “poll tax” ? And the fact that all of this seems to be carefully timed so as to be damn close to the cut off for election registration should raise monumental red flags ! Demanding new registration documentation from people already on voter rosters and the purging of voter lists, already showing that many legitimate voters are being cast off those lists,  the shortening of polling hours and in some cases, eliminating early voting – does not one understand that this is an orchestrated scheme to seriously dilute the opposition voter block ?  I am not one for conspiracy theories as a rule but this campaign to keep hundreds of thousands from being able to exercise their constitutional Right is a product of a well planned one carefully carried out by the GOP and its affiliates, not to mention its political beneficiaries – those who will considerably increase their wealth with the proposed Romney Tax plan.

I am convinced that the election system in this country needs serious reform, especially for national elections. The so called “Redistricting” rules are clearly out of sync with the rule that voting districts are population based. In the 2000  Redistricting process in Arizona, the Department of Justice handed down the criteria for determining districts. Number one on the list was number of people – population.After all, representation in Congress is based in population. However, when the final drafts were submitted, population was not even close to the top. It took years for the DOJ to finally approve the maps.Several states have had such a history of voter discrimination, that the Department of Justice requires their approval before any changes are made in voting or voting procedures. Not much has changed in those states, protests to the contrary notwithstanding. A  candidate can, in fact, win the popular vote but actually lose the election based on electoral  vote count. In 2000, G W Bush was, in my opinion, not elected but rather appointed by the Supreme Court. Their decision revolved around  widespread voting machine dysfunction in Florida. He did not win the popular vote either but, because of the debacle in Florida and how it was resolved, he polled 271 Electoral votes to Al Gore’s 266.

The system is indeed flawed  and I think both sides of the aisle agree on that. However, to instigate so called reform measures to protect against in person fraud   at a time so close to a national election ( instead of years ago ) and in the complete absence of any documented evidence substantiating the ” problem “, makes one have to conclude this whole campaign is a out and out drive to seize the right to vote away from those who would probably vote for the opposition. It is targeted, well funded, organized and has dire consequences for the future.  It is conceivable that this election may well be decided by money and influence rather than votes. reform is one thing, but reverting to 1790, well, that’s a dog of a completely different color.

To quote Chris Hayes of MSNBC, there is something “… profane about trying to stop people from exercising that right.” ( to vote ).