Dear John,
Please take the time to read the letter I penned to Martin Luther King Jr. urging us all to take time and reflect about the importance of protecting our voting rights.
Dear Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. -
Happy Birthday. Yesterday, Monday, January 17, 2022, was “Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day.” A national holiday, the day our Nation celebrates your birth and legacy.
Part of that legacy, your legacy, is the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Today those voting rights that you and so many others fought for are under attack. A coordinated attack meant to strip people of color of this sacred right.
Democracy is coming down to the fight over the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. I wish I could sit with you and ask what would you do if you were here today. As I cannot sit with you, I look back upon the wisdom you gave to the world. As you once said: “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” My hope is that those with voices louder than mine will amplify this message.
For those that read this, please share and amplify the following:
The Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act should not in any way be controversial. Here are some of the highlights:
* Two weeks of early voting for any town with more than 3,000 people, including on nights and weekends, for at least 10 hours a day.
* The option to vote by mail, or to drop off ballots at either a polling place or a drop box. These votes will be counted so long as they are postmarked on or before Election Day and arrive at the polling place within a week.
* Election Day would become a holiday.
* It would create uniform standards for voter IDs in states that require them.
The Freedom to Vote Act cracks down on voter suppression. It makes it a federal crime to lie to voters in order to deter them from voting, and it increases the penalties for voter intimidation. It restores federal voting rights for people who have served time in jail, creating a uniform system out of the our current patchwork.
Using measures already in place in a number of states, the Freedom to Vote Act provides uniform voter registration rules. It establishes automatic voter registration at state Departments of Motor Vehicles, permits same-day voter registration, allows online voter registration, and protects voters from the purges that have plagued voting registrations for decades now, requiring that voters be notified if they are dropped from the rolls and given information on how to get back on them.
The Freedom to Vote Act also protects local election officers from intimidation and firing for partisan purposes. It expands penalties for tampering with ballots after an election.
The act also prevents attempts to overturn elections by requiring audits after elections, making sure those audits have clearly defined rules and procedures.
The John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act (VRAA) takes on issues of discrimination in voting by updating and restoring the 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA) that the Supreme Court gutted in 2013 and 2021. The VRA required that states with a history of discrimination must have had changes they wanted to make to their voting laws approved by the federal Department of Justice before the changes went into effect.
The VRAA provides a new, modern formula for determining which states need pre-approval, based on how many voting rights violations they’ve had in the past 25 years. After ten years without violations, they will no longer need pre-clearance.
The VRAA also restores the ability of voters to sue if their rights are violated.
The VRAA directly addresses the ability of Indigenous Americans, who face unique voting problems, to vote. It requires at least one polling place on tribal lands, for example, and requires states to accept tribal or federal IDs.
In a democratic society our vote is our voice. At the heart of making our criminal justice system equitable for all is the right to vote. Without the right to vote we have no say in how our society is governed. Without the right to vote we have no voice in our society. The right to vote is the most important and a sacred part of democracy. As an organization that works tirelessly to in the arena of policy we understand the importance of voting rights. We understand the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and the importance of protecting this legacy and the voting rights.
Please take the time to read both the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.
Thank you for your continued support.
Sincerely,
Sam Lewis
Executive Director
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