Lawyers Democracy Fund

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December 17, 2008
Lawyers Democracy Fund drafted an Amicus Brief in the case of Coleman v. Ritchie in the Minnesota Supreme Court regarding the Minnesota Senate election recount between Norm Coleman and Al Franken. Some excerpts are below:

"The State Canvassing Board has requested county election officials to reexamine previously rejected absentee ballots to determine if they were mistakenly rejected. There is no legal authority for such a request and counties representing a significant fraction of Minnesota voters have declined to participate. As a result, it is an absolute certainty that absentee ballots will not be treated the same in all parts of the State. Ballots in counties that do not participate will not be reviewed at all. Ballots in participating counties will be reviewed under the idiosyncratic methods adopted by the election judges in each county. . . . Here, there is no legal basis for the Board’s ad hoc approach and there are no criteria to guide the county election judges. That guarantees that absentee ballots in different counties will be treated differently in this ad hoc review, a clear violation of equal protection. ."


The complete brief is available here. On December 18, 2009 the Supreme Court issued an order stating that only those absentee ballots that both parties agree were improperly rejected were to be counted. Additional litigation ensued, but ultimately, in June, the Minnesota Supreme Court declared Al Franken the winner of the race.


October 31, 2008
Lawyers Democracy Fund requested that (now former) U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey reconsider a policy change to refrain from utilizing criminal prosecutors as election monitors during Election Day. In a coalition letter, LDF stated:

"The Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice has historically been the defender of the right to vote, a foundational element in our democracy. However, recent policy changes regarding the Department’s responsibility toward protecting that right raise concerns regarding the integrity of this critical election cycle. The Division’s decision to refrain from utilizing criminal prosecutors as election monitors is a step backward in efforts to protect the integrity of our electoral system."


The complete letter is available here.


Lawyers Democracy Fund continued its mission with an Amicus Brief filed cooperatively with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in support of the respondents in Bartlett v. Strickland (No. 07-689). The oral arguments was heard on Tuesday, October 14, 2008. The brief reads in part:

"[T]he only way for a state legislature or city council to effectuate such a statutory requirement would be to make race the paramount consideration in virtually every districting decision. In this case, North Carolina would be compelled to ignore a state constitutional requirement to preserve county boundaries and create a crossover district guaranteed to elect a specific incumbent member. This would be a design driven not by traditionally accepted redistricting criteria...but by race and the use of race as a proxy for partisan objectives. ... The Court has repeatedly recognized that political subdivisions serve as the single most effective barrier to gerrymandering. Casting aside state requirements such as North Carolina's "Whole County" provisions in the name of racial maximization would transform the Voting Rights Act from a shield for minority voting rights into a sword for partisan gerrymandering. This is not what Congress intended."


For the complete text go to here. In a 5-4 decision on March 9, 2009, the Supreme Court upheld the North Carolina Supreme Court’s decision holding that a “minority group must constitute a numerical majority of the voting-age population in an area before §2 requires the creation of a legislative district to prevent dilution of that group’s votes.”

Lawyers Democracy Fund filed an Amicus Brief in the Indiana Voter ID Case. The case was argued before the Supreme Court on January 9, 2008. The Court upheld the Indiana Voter Identification Law. A few excerpts are below:

The Seventh Circuit panel below confirmed the common sense rationale for Indiana's Voter ID requirement. Citing the 2005 Carter-Baker Commission Report, the panel observed that today, no person in the United States can board an airline, enter a government building, or purchase liquor or cigarettes, without providing photo identification. Voting is one of the core elements of our American freedoms, and the right to vote is precious. Yet the historic record of vote fraud in America is clear. Attempts to steal the vote, and thus steal a measure of each honest citizen’s franchise, are neither imagined, nor implausible. Unfortunately, a long list of such attempts can be compiled since the turn of this century just seven years ago.

. . . The Voter ID law does not impose a severe burden on the right to vote. On the contrary, by reducing vote fraud, it preserves the right to vote. An eligible voter whose ballot is nullified by an illegal vote has been disenfranchised just as much as an eligible voter who cannot cast a ballot.

. . . More than 99% of Indiana voters already have photo ID and possession of such documentation is necessary to exercise numerous other constitutional rights, such as the right to file suit in federal court or to travel aboard commercial aircraft. Petitioners have not identified a single person whom photo ID would prevent from voting and the district court excluded their statistical evidence as "utterly incredible."


For the complete text go to here.

About Us


The Lawyers Democracy Fund (LDF) is a non profit organization created to promote social welfare by engaging in activities to promote the role of ethics and legal professionalism in the electoral process. Our efforts will focus on three areas. One will be to create proposed uniform election code, similar to other uniform codes, to provide guidance to legislators interested in reforming their electoral systems. Secondly, we will conduct, fund, and publish research regarding the effectiveness of current election methods, particularly those reports that fail to receive adequate coverage in the national media. Thirdly, we intend to provide legal education opportunities for lawyers interested in election law.