The mission of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is to secure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights in order to eliminate race-based discrimination and ensure the health and well-being of all persons.
Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter.
The Missouri Supreme Court will review the state's limitations on voting by mail, among the strictest being enforced in the country this spring, in case the governor rejects legislation relaxing the rules.
The appeal comes after a trial court judge dismissed a lawsuit seeking to make absentee ballots available to everyone in the state starting with the Aug. 4 primary.
Exposure to the coronavirus should be reason enough to vote by mail, and the state's rebuffing of that valid excuse during the pandemic is unconstitutional, the suit maintains. It's the same argument being made by voting rights groups hoping to force relaxation of excuse requirements in the remaining handful of states that have not done so voluntarily: Texas, most prominently, plus, Tennessee, Mississippi and Connecticut.
All six states require an excuse for voting by mail, which could produce lines at the polls similar to Wisconsin's this month.
The coronavirus has forced a fundamental reassessment of how best to allow citizens to both stay safe and carry out their most important civic responsibility — voting.
Almost half the states have already eased restrictions that would make it tougher to cast a ballot during the pandemic, and more may do so soon. But at the same time, six states now stand out as having the most restrictive voting rules in the country. And those hurdles will either disenfranchise or threaten the health of millions this year, assuming critical adjustments are not made soon and Covid-19 continues to upend normal life until fall.
Civic engagement and progressive groups this week launched their campaign in Colorado to defeat one of the hottest ballot measures in the world of democracy reform this year.
The proposal would make the state quit a deal it made just a year ago: It pledged to award all its electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote, as soon as states with 270 votes in the Electoral College (a majority) do likewise.
Fifteen other states and Washington, D.C., with a combined 187 votes, have joined the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. All of them are more deeply blue than Colorado, which has tilted increasingly that way — and is the first place where a grassroots campaign to exit the compact has gained significant traction.
Advocates for making voting safer and easier this year are showering Congress with appeals for help in the next coronavirus response package.
The flow of letters, e-mail and appeals posted online has accelerated in recent days, as lawmakers have started haggling over a fourth aid package since the pandemic took hold. But any decisions have now been delayed at least two weeks, as the Senate on Tuesday joined the House in postponing lawmakers' earliest return until the week of May 4.
The missives have much in common: They are signed mainly by progressive groups, augmented by a handful of cross-partisan good governance organizations. They focus on getting more money for expanding mail-in voting, early in-person voting, online registration and other steps to protect the electorate and election workers from the virus. And they stop short of calling for federal requirements for states spending the aid.
