Yet another voting rights case and another partial victory for those seeking to preserve the right to vote.
In Martin v. Crittenden, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia (per May, J.) held that the Gwinnett County, Georgia Board of Election Members:
[A]re hereby ENJOINED from rejecting absentee ballots containing an error or omission relating to the absentee voter’s year of birth and are ORDERED to count such ballots in the November 6, 2018 election [and] are ORDERED to delay certification until such ballots have been counted.
I am old enough to recall that one of the worse things you could be called in a political or social debate was “Un-American.” Well, those who try to suppress voting and limit voting rights are truly and completely Un-American.
Jarndyce says
I dislike the epithet “Un-American.” To suppress voting is wrong, because it is a step toward dictatorship, and dictatorship is wrong. To suppress voting in North Korea, where voting is not allowed at all, is wrong, even though it is not “Un-North Korean,” but is in fact “North Korean.”
The problem with the epithet “Un-American” is the same as the problem with saying “That’s not the way we are” when one disapproves of something we do, such as kidnapping the children of migrants. The problem with saying “That’s not the way we are” is that it IS the way we are. We’re the ones who are doing it, right? We are our ideals (actually the ideals of only some of us), but we are also our actions.
paulw says
It’s aspirational, in one direction or another.
Ken Rhodes says
I disagree with your semantics.
I think it’s legitimate to use the adjective “un-American” to be shorthand for “against the principals of America.” (Recognizing that “America” is itself shorthand for The United States of America.)
Principals are different from this year’s behavior. Principals been subject to a lot of dispute over the last two centuries, but there’s a historical meaning that I don’t think is overturned by any year-to-year change in the way the wind happens to be blowing.
Jarndyce says
I disagree with your spelling.
Seriously, what principles are we talking about? Imperialism? That hasn’t changed year-to-year. We invaded Canada during the War of 1812, Mexico during the Mexican War, then there was the Spanish-American War and the invasion of the Philippines; I won’t go into the 20th and 21st centuries. Racism? From protecting slavery in the Constitution, to Jim Crow, to lynchings, to drug prohibition, and to cops today murdering black people with impunity. How can we call either imperialism or racism “un-American”? As H. Rap Brown said about violence, they are as American as cherry pie. Or are only the good things about this country “American”?