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Comment by lostcolony | Hacker News Reader

Citation needed. "It's against the constitution" - where? Cite an article, quote a paragraph, something. You say the Supreme Court has decided this; fine, quote a court case. I'm not saying you're wrong, but I have no idea what you're talking about.

We have plenty of de facto ID systems. But I'd argue they aren't mandatory because -there is no political will to make them mandatory-. What is achieved by doing so?

Hell, the same political party that would object most vociferously to making them mandatory (because of religious reasons and cost to the taxpayer) is also the one pushing for laws to require issued IDs to vote, a right that -is- guaranteed in the constitution.

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No law so far ever required single form of ID to vote. All voter ID laws require some form of ID, which could be of many forms - driver license, citizenship id, passport, military ID, handgun license, special voter ID, and so on. There are many forms of ID that are accepted (and if you don't have any, as much as a copy of a recent utility bill and a signed affidavit may exempt you from the requirement). This is nowhere even near establishing a single nation-wide ID system, or even a state-wide one.

the topic here is a national mechanism, and states could (asininely) allow lesser forms, even exclude the national one.

I said "require issued IDs to vote". Countering with "there are many forms of ID that are accepted" doesn't really feel like you're arguing against what I said.

What I am trying to emphasize here is that there's a difference between "a myriad of disjoined systems which can be used to identify somebody" and "a single system that includes data about everybody". The difference is a bit like being able to hire a PI to follow somebody and having everybody's whereabouts in a single centralized database 24/7. Not the same thing, wouldn't you agree?

But also...not at all relevant to the point I'm making, which is that a mandatory ID is not against the Constitution (that I know of), and that we -could- create a mandatory national ID, but there's no political will for it. That's it.

I provided an example of that, by pointing out where even the party whose stated goal is to validate a person's identity for voting (i.e., where a mandatory national ID would help with one of their stated goals; certainly, it would remove the objections the other party has) still isn't pushing for a mandatory national ID.

You commenting how multiple types of non-mandatory IDs are included in the bills that that party supports...isn't gainsaying anything I said, nor the point I was making. I'm not sure why you bothered.

There are cases spanning a century across several creative legislative attempts by the US Congress to create a de facto mandatory national identity system. This information is not difficult to find. All of them tried to workaround the fact that States can create mandatory identity systems but the Federal government cannot. (It is one of the reasons SSN cards go out of their way to assert they are not to be used as an ID.)

Past attempts included things like withholding tax disbursements to non-compliant States, but the US Supreme Court deemed that coercive and therefore illegal. The Real ID Act is the latest attempt but it has been delayed for many years by State non-compliance and general unwillingness to share their identity databases with the Federal government.

The ID required to vote is a State ID, which is perfectly Constitutional. No one is requiring a Federal ID to vote. In fact, many States will not recognize any Federal ID, including passports.

Name a case.

"This information is not difficult to find"

Then please find and supply it. -I- have had difficulty finding it. It certainly isn't so easy to find as "here is a linked citation supporting my claim", since you've yet to provide one.

"The Real ID Act is the latest attempt but it has been delayed for many years by State non-compliance and general unwillingness to share their identity databases with the Federal government." - not at all. Everything you said just in this post is incorrect, but more egregiously (and why I'm not even bothering to point out why it's incorrect), it's also -irrelevant-. Real ID...isn't mandatory. Not at the state level, not at the federal level.

"The ID required to vote is a State ID, which is perfectly Constitutional" - there isn't an ID required to vote according to the Constitution. In practice, most states also don't require any form of ID. Hence all the bills by the GOP to try and require one, while also doing nothing to ensure it is affordable and convenient (i.e., creating a form of poll tax); the GOP doesn't even care about it as an ID system, just as a form of voter suppression.

Which is my point; no legislature, not even the people trying to require ID for things, is pushing for mandatory IDs. It's not against the Constitution as far as I can tell, and you've done nothing to convince me; it just isn't politically worth pushing for given the resistance it would face so has never happened.

> There are cases spanning a century across several creative legislative attempts by the US Congress to create a de facto mandatory national identity system.

Then it should be easy to present one, preferably the most applicable one to modern proposals.

> This information is not difficult to find.

Its not easy to find the arguments of the people opposed to national ID, and its not easy to verify that the cases they cite are not about national IDs.

> All of them tried to workaround the fact that States can create mandatory identity systems but the Federal government cannot

None of the national ID debates have been about a mandatory ID (a mandatory-for-specific-purposes ID, yes, but the feds already issue a number of those.)

> (It is one of the reasons SSN cards go out of their way to assert they are not to be used as an ID.)

No, social security cards say that because they aren’t designed to validate identity, since all they contain is a name and a number and no way other than possession (which is extremely problematic) to associate that with a particular person.

> Past attempts included things like withholding tax disbursements to non-compliant States

[citation needed]

> but the US Supreme Court deemed that coercive and therefore illegal.

[citation needed]

> The Real ID Act is the latest attempt

Real ID is not a mandatory ID, but a required-for-enumerated purposes ID. The enumerated purposes are ones for which the federal government already establishes acceptable ID standards without any Constitutional challenge, under various Article I, Sec. 8 powers, Real ID is just a change to the standards. And all phases of it but for Phase 4 involving (notably) the mandated to use Real ID for commercial air travel have already gone into effect. Starting in 2014.

but it has been delayed for many years by State non-compliance and general unwillingness to share their identity databases with the Federal government.

The anti commandeering doctrine, from the 10th amendment is what prohibits the federal government forcing states to implement a mandatory federal ID requirement for things like applying for credit or opening a bank account

Voting is not a constitutional right.

Voting Rights Act is statutory like most of our laws.

> Voting is not a constitutional right.

Yes it is.

> Voting Rights Act is statutory like most of our laws.

Constitutional rights are often enforced by legislation; Amendments articulating rights often explicitly authorize this. See, with regard to voting rights, the 15th, 19th, and 26th Amendments. (EDIT: also, the 14th Amendment [see Sec. 2 and 5], and, as noted in a sibling comment, the 24th Amendment. Also the 17th Amendment, though that doesn’t have a Congressional enforcement clause. Voting rights are the single most common subject of Constitutional amendments.)

15th Amendment:

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

The 19th Amendment has identical language for "on account of sex", the 24th Amendment has "by reason of failure to pay a poll tax or any other tax", the 26th Amendment has "on account of age" for 18 years and older.

Like many other things in the Constitution, the constitutional text defines the general principle and the power of the federal government to enforce it, and normal legislation establishes the actual enforcement mechanisms.

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