The U.S. House of Representatives voted this week to do away with one of the most effective deterrents to campaign finance corruption our nation has relied on since the Watergate scandal of the 1970s.
ALEC isn’t a guy. ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council, is a factory for anti-voter legislation, funded by power barons like Kraft Foods, McDonalds, Pfizer and the Koch brothers.
They are the driving force behind the recent flood of discriminatory voter ID laws, like the one in Texas, where a state-issued concealed handgun permit is an acceptable form of identification…but a state-issued student ID from a university is not.
In 1920, a major effort to register newly enfranchised voters and educate them in the political process was prominent on the agenda of the just formed League of Women Voters. A few years later, state Leagues were challenged to increase voter turnout by 25 percent, leading the Alabama League to note: “…it is a very difficult matter to qualify for the vote in Alabama…”
This week, we joined with the League of Women Voters of Texas in urging the U.S. Department of Justice to object to the Texas congressional redistricting plan. The Texas plan is by far the most extreme example of racial gerrymandering among all the redistricting proposals passed by lawmakers so far this year. This plan is blatantly designed to stifle the voices of minority voters in favor of locking in partisan gains. Read our statement and letter here.
League President MacNamara's statement marking this weekend's 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks calls on Americans to "honor [those that died] by renewing our efforts to reinvigorate our democracy." "We cannot give up and cannot give in to those who would prefer to hate and to exclude in a vain effort to make us more secure," urged MacNamara. Read her full statement here.
The League of Women Voters is proud to celebrate 91 years of women voting. This Women’s Equality Day, we are grateful for all that our foremothers did to ensure women could actively participate in our political system, and we look forward to all that women will do in the future.
Late yesterday, Kansas Governor Sam Brownback signed a restrictive new voter id and proof of citizenship bill into law. Kansas President Ernestine Krehbiel expressed "deep disappointment" with yesterday's events
Anyone who knows the League knows that government transparency and accountability are core to our mission as an organization, and to us, they are core to a strong and healthy democracy. But why should these be important to people in their everyday lives?
