Tuesday - November 07, 2006

A Swarm Of Locusts

It’s Election Day ... and lawyers will outnumber voters by a margin of 2 to 1 at the polling places. Forget Al-Qaeda and Islamofascists. We are being terrorized by a swarm of legal beagles. All of this could be avoided if we only had (1) National ID cards (with smart chips and biometric imprints), (2) bulletproof and hack-proof electronic voting machines connected to a national tabulating database recording votes in real-time and ... (3) voters intelligent enough to use all that. The first two are easily attainable. The last requirement will never be met. Too many Democrats ...

_{Bruce Beattie - US News & World Report}

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As Vote Nears, Parties Prepare for Legal Fights
_{WASHINGTON (NY TIMES) - November 7, 2006}

A team of lawyers for the Democratic Party has been arguing with postal officials in Columbus, Ohio, trying to persuade them to process thousands of absentee ballots that have arrived with insufficient postage. In Pennsylvania, the Republican Party has opened a “recount account” and set aside $500,000 to pay lawyers who will answer telephones on Election Day and monitor polls to see whether officials demand proper voters’ identification. In Maryland, lawyers representing candidates for senator and governor from both parties met recently and swapped cellphone numbers and e-mail addresses to smooth out the logistics of potential litigation.

Several days from what Republican and Democratic campaign strategists expect to be a close election, the legal machinery of a messy fight is shifting into high gear. Democrats say they are most concerned that voters will be prevented from voting by long lines or poll workers’ demanding unnecessary forms of identification. Republicans say they are guarding against ineligible people trying to vote.

The parties are sending their largest concentrations of lawyers to states with the tightest races like Maryland, Missouri, Ohio and Tennessee. Most of them are unpaid volunteers, though many from large firms are working pro bono to meet their firms’ expectation for hours of public service.

On Saturday and Sunday, hundreds of the 7,000 lawyers who are working on the election for the Democratic National Committee will board planes for Arizona, Florida, Maryland, Missouri, Ohio and 13 other states.

Their task is to reinforce local teams where party officials say they there is the greatest potential for long lines, voter intimidation or confusion at the polls and where they may need to file court petitions to keep polls open late. “We’re not going to make the mistake we did last time, which was to wait until after the election for litigation,” said Chris Redfern, chairman of the Ohio Democratic Party.

That party has spent $250,000 in legal fees on suits over new electronic voting machines and a voter identification law. The Republican National Committee is shipping out 150 lawyers on Monday to help hundreds of local lawyers in Florida, Michigan, Missouri, Tennessee and other states answering phones and working at polling stations policing against voter fraud.

“What is unfortunate is that it appears Democrats are following their playbook from 2004 and alleging voter suppression where it does not exist, in an effort to launch a pre-emptive strike,” said Tracey Schmitt, spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee.

It is not just parties gearing up. In its largest mobilization ever for a non-presidential election, the Justice Department will dispatch about 800 lawyers to potentially troubled polling locations in 65 cities in 20 states to ensure voting rights laws are obeyed.

The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the N.A.A.C.P. and the People for the American Way Foundation will jointly have 2,000 lawyers fanning out across 20 states.

- More ...

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/07/2006 at 02:20 AM   
Filed Under: • Judges-Courts-Lawyers • Politics •  
• Comments (5) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

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Not that very many people ever read this far down, but this blog was the creation of Allan Kelly and his friend Vilmar. Vilmar moved on to his own blog some time ago, and Allan ran this place alone until his sudden and unexpected death partway through 2006. We all miss him. A lot. Even though he is gone this site will always still be more than a little bit his. We who are left to carry on the BMEWS tradition owe him a great debt of gratitude, and we hope to be able to pay that back by following his last advice to us all:

1. Keep a firm grasp of Right and Wrong
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It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

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