Supreme Court Ruling Means Legislature Must Reform Voting Rights Restoration

Overturning a lower court ruling, the Washington Supreme Court yesterday found that conditioning the right to vote on payment of court-imposed fines does not violate the state and federal constitutions.

“Our current system for restoring voting rights is so complicated and confusing that even elections officials are often unsure who is eligible to vote. The Legislature needs to fix this broken system before the 2008 presidential election,” said Kathleen Taylor, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington.

The 6-3 ruling came in a case brought by the ACLU in 2005 on behalf of three citizens who have served their prison terms but are denied the right to vote solely because they owe money. Under current state law, even though individuals have finished terms, they are not allowed to vote until they completely pay a variety of monetary debts to the legal system that are imposed at sentencing. Interest on these legal system debts accrues at the exorbitant rate of 12 percent a year.

According to Washington’s own statistics, more than 90 percent of felony defendants are indigent at the time of charging. It is no surprise that many ex-felons find it difficult to pay these financial assessments upon release.

Sadly, the problem is widespread and hits people of color especially hard. In 2002, according to the Department of Corrections, 46,500 ex-felons in Washington were unable to vote just because of outstanding “legal financial obligations.” Disenfranchisement affects about 3.7 percent of eligible voters in Washington – almost double the national average. And, given the racial disparity in Washington’s incarceration rate, the state disenfranchises almost 25 percent of all adult African-American males. 

In the 2007 state Legislature, the ACLU supported a measure sponsored by Rep. Jeannie Darneille and Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles that would automatically restore the franchise to citizens who have completed serving their time in prison. The bill won widespread backing, including support from the League of Women Voters, the Paralyzed Veterans of America, and the Coalition of Sexual Assault Programs, but did not pass. The ACLU will continue to press for its passage.

“It is fundamentally unfair to bar citizens from voting solely because of their financial means. Automatically restoring the right to vote upon release from prison would remedy this injustice, as well as clarify and streamline our system,” said the ACLU’s Kathleen Taylor.

The ACLU has been heartened by growing recognition from political leaders of the need to reform the state’s law. Governor Christine Gregoire has said that while people with felony convictions must be responsible for their debts, “ …once they have served their time, withholding certain rights due to fines becomes a virtual debtors’ prison.”

Plaintiffs in the lawsuit were Dan Madison of King County, Beverly DuBois of Spokane County, and Dannielle Garner of Snohomish County.

Handling the case for the ACLU were Peter Danelo and Molly Terwilliger of the firm Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe, ACLU-WA staff attorney Aaron Caplan, and Neil Bradley of the ACLU Voting Rights Project.

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