Racial disparity in voting rights is a sign of Kentucky’s broken system

Most of us would rather wear shorts outside in January than follow jargon-filled legal battles. But we would do well to pay attention to a recent lawsuit that raises a question with very real implications for our country: Is voting a privilege to be bestowed only on the favored few, or a critical right that forms the very foundation of our democratic government?

Four ex-felons have filed suit to argue that Kentucky’s process for restoring voting rights to felons is unconstitutional.

In Kentucky, convicted felons are permanently disenfranchised; their voting rights can only be restored by an executive order from the governor.

Prior to leaving office, former Gov. Steve Beshear signed an executive order to automatically restore voting rights to nonviolent felons upon completion of their sentences.

Two weeks after taking office, Gov. Matt Bevin rescinded that order, claiming that it was unnecessary. He then failed to sign any suffrage applications during his first year as governor.

Since Bevin took office, more than 1,700 felons have submitted applications to restore suffrage. As of September 2018, Bevin had granted 981. That leaves over 700 applications we have no way of tracking. Even more troubling, according to Judy Johnson of the Lexington League of Women Voters, Bevin signs applications only twice a year: on the Fourth of July and Christmas. Our governor apparently does see re-enfranchisement as a special gift to be dispensed only on holidays.

As Amanda Hall, an ex-felon who now works for the ACLU of Kentucky, told me, “There’s no rhyme or reason to whose rights the governor restores, or whose he doesn’t, or when he signs those papers.” Hall’s own application sat on the governor’s desk for “about two and a half years,” an exorbitant length of time that is dishearteningly common in Kentucky.

The recent lawsuit argues that this arbitrary and opaque process increases the likelihood of discrimination and violates felons’ First Amendment rights.

The severity of this situation becomes clearer when viewed in a national context. After Florida voters in November overwhelmingly approved an amendment automatically restoring suffrage to former felons, Kentucky lags as one of just two states, alongside Iowa, that permanently disenfranchise felons.

Unlike in Florida, Kentuckians have no right to petition for a ballot initiative. Instead, only the legislature can put a constitutional amendment on the ballot. Republicans in our legislature have blocked efforts to let Kentucky voters restore the franchise to felons, making this lawsuit the only option.

And what a problem it is: almost one in ten adult Kentuckians have lost the right to vote due to a prior conviction, including an estimated one in three African-American males. Kentuckians in the latter group are over twice as likely to lose their right to vote as to have a college degree. This racial disparity in and of itself is a sign that the current system is broken.

Furthermore, felony disenfranchisement erodes the very foundation of our government. state Sen. Reggie Thomas explained that “as a citizen of a democracy, one of the central rights you have is the right of self-determination.” Therefore, as Johnson claimed, “Any kind of voter suppression cracks the framework of democracy.”

Losing the right to vote also means losing the ability to participate in politics, causing many felons to feel disengaged from their society. Studies have shown that disenfranchised felons are twice as likely to recidivate as those with voting rights.

Indeed, as the new lawsuit makes clear, ex-felons often value their right to vote more than the thousands of eligible Americans who fail to turn up to the polls each year. Hall said that when she voted this November for the first time in eight years, she felt she “had a small fraction of say-so in the direction of my life and the lives of the people that I love.”

The eventual decision in Harbin v. Bevin will be based on legal standards, not stories like Hall’s. But we should all be swayed by the moral and emotional repercussions of depriving felons of such a critical right.