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Despite my real outrage about racial disparity in criminal "justice" + the drug war, I'm having a hard time getting behind this "let current prisoners vote" movement. A few thoughts:
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1. Prison ≠ jail. 540,000 people (about 1/4 of the incarcerated population) are in PRETRIAL detention in county jails. Per SCOTUS's O’Brien v. Skinner decision, they HAVE the right to vote -- but few realize it, + it's unevenly implemented. We should work on THAT first.
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@margaretbarthel 2. Although we have FAR too many people in prison, most prisoners miss only one election: "The average time served by state prisoners released in 2016, from initial admission to initial release, was 2.6 years, and the median time served was 1.3 years." bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=p…
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@margaretbarthel 3. POST-prison felony disenfranchisement laws are a much bigger problem. 6.1 million people are barred from voting even after they've served their time -- and that disability is ongoing, not just the single election most actual inmates miss. sentencingproject.org/publications/6…
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@margaretbarthel 4. Vote-from-prison is a weak general election issue (only 24% support); felony re-enfranchisement is a strong election issue (63% support, even including most Trump voters)...
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@margaretbarthel ... which suggests that focusing on re-enfranchisement BOTH solves a larger problem AND is more likely to help elect the people who want to solve it.
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@margaretbarthel 5. There's a Constitutional obstacle. The 14th Amendment prevents the right to vote from being "in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime." ...
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@margaretbarthel Just forcing states to restore voting rights after a completed sentence is tough given this language; forcing them to let CURRENT prisoners vote likely is impossible without a Constitutional amendment -- and we've got more important amendments (Electoral College!) to focus on.
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@margaretbarthel I'm not saying that allowing current prisoners to vote is a bad idea, let alone morally wrong. I grok the counterarguments. But to me, it seems like a distraction from pursuing former-felon and pre-conviction voting rights, which would do more good and are more doable.
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