Tennessee seeks to dismiss voter ID lawsuit
A lawsuit that contends age discrimination was written into Tennessee's voter identification law because it does not allow use of student IDs has stalled as a federal judge considers whether it is a valid case.
Lawyers for a group of students and those for the state disagree on how to interpret the 44-year-old constitutional amendment that lowered the voting age to 18, and what impact that has on Tennessee's law. The students say the state law, which prohibits using student identification cards to vote, is unconstitutional.
Lawyers in the Tennessee Attorney General's Office asked the federal judge to dismiss the case, saying the students did not make a valid claim and their interpretation of the amendment was wrong.
U.S. District Judge Aleta Trauger has stopped the lawyers from exchanging evidence or acting on subpoenas while she weighs the arguments of both sides, according to court records.
The dispute is based in part on the interpretation of the 26th Amendment, which lowered the legal voting age to 18 in 1971. The students argue the intent also was to stop age discrimination, in part because of language that says voting rights should not be denied "on account of age."
The state argues that the Tennessee law is not discriminatory and is not based on age. College students, the state says in court filings, can be of any age.
Likely to be key in the debate is a 2008 U.S. Supreme Court ruling upholding Indiana's voter ID law. The case, Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, allowed states to require photo identification as a way to prevent voter fraud. Tennessee lawmakers have argued student IDs are easier to forge, thus more susceptible to fraud.
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The Nashville Student Organizing Committee and seven students, working with the Washington, D.C.-based voting rights organization Fair Elections Legal Network and the Nashville law firm Barrett Johnston Martin & Garrison, filed the lawsuit against Secretary of State Tre Hargett and Coordinator of Elections Mark Goins in March.
The filing capped years of back-and-forth over Tennessee's law. There were protests and multiple failed attempts in the Tennessee General Assembly to allow use of student identification.
"Plaintiffs allege that the ID law was a deliberate effort to skew the electorate towards older voters and away from younger voters, (legal citation omitted) and have accordingly alleged intentional age discrimination in violation of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment and a denial of equal protection to public college and university students," the students' filing reads.
The students ask that if the judge dismisses the case she also will allow them to refile it with changes.
Reach Stacey Barchenger at 615-726-8968 and on Twitter @sbarchenger.