Opinion ID: 4027534
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Disparate Burden on African-American Voters

Text: The first step in evaluating the plaintiffs’ equal protection challenge requires us to identify the “character and magnitude” of the burden on African-American voters as a result of the challenged law. The district court identified the burden imposed on some African Americans’ right to vote by considering the changes effected by S.B. 238, rather than by examining Ohio’s election regime as a whole. The court found that operation of S.B. 238 resulted in a disparate burden on some African Americans as a function of two changes: “(1) by reducing the overall [early in-person] voting period, and (2) by eliminating the opportunity for [same-day registration].” R. 117, Opinion at 35, Page ID 6157. Regarding the reduction of the early in-person voting period, the district court discerned a burden after accepting three simple premises: (1) that tens of thousands of people voted during Golden Week in both 2008 and 2012 and are likely to do so in the upcoming 2016 election; (2) that S.B. 238’s elimination of Golden Week requires that “[i]ndividuals who would have voted during Golden Week in future elections must now vote on other days during the early voting period, vote absentee by mail, vote on Election Day, or not vote at all;” and (3) because African Americans have shown a preference for voting early in person (and during Golden Week) at a rate higher than other voters, the “elimination of the extra days for EIP voting provided by Golden Week will disproportionately burden African Americans.” Id. at 36, Page ID 6158. The district court further noted that beginning early in-person voting after the registration period eliminated “same-day registration,” meaning that “voters must now register and vote at separate times, which increases the ‘cost of voting,’ especially for socioeconomically disadvantaged groups.” Id. at 40, Page ID 6162. That is, the court recognized that “it may be more difficult for voters with time, resource, transportation, and childcare restraints to make two separate trips to register and vote, and Golden Week allowed individuals to do both at once.” Id. The district court concluded that, because “African Americans in particular are more No. 16-3561 Ohio Democratic Party, et al. v. Husted, et al. Page 10 likely to be subject to economic, transportation, time, and childcare constraints,” id. at 40, Page ID 6162, they “disproportionately make up the group that benefits the most from [same-day registration], and the elimination of that opportunity burdens their right to vote.” Id. at 42, Page ID 6164. Taking the reduction in early in-person voting days and the elimination of same-day registration together, the district court characterized the changes effected by S.B. 238 as imposing a “modest” burden on African Americans’ right to vote. Id.
As a threshold matter, we note that the district court’s characterization of the resultant burden as “modest” is not a factual finding, but a legal determination subject to de novo review. See Bright v. Gallia Cnty., 753 F.3d 639, 652 (6th Cir. 2014) (explaining that “legal conclusions masquerading as factual allegations” do not convert legal questions into factual ones); Libertarian Party of Ohio v. Blackwell, 462 F.3d 579, 587 (6th Cir. 2006) (evaluating factual and evidentiary factors to reach a legal conclusion on the “magnitude” of burden); Hargett, 767 F.3d at 547 (“Whether a voting regulation imposes a severe burden is a question with both legal and factual dimensions.”); Williams v. Mehra, 186 F.3d 685, 689 (6th Cir. 1999) (en banc) (applying de novo review to mixed questions of law and fact, observing that “findings of ultimate fact based on the application of legal principles to subsidiary facts are subject to de novo review.”). Inasmuch as the State does not challenge the district court’s findings of fact, we evaluate de novo the district court’s application of legal principles to those subsidiary facts in characterizing the burden made out by those facts. The undisputed factual record shows that it’s easy to vote in Ohio. Very easy, actually. Viewing S.B. 238 as one component of Ohio’s progressive voting system, and considering the many options that remain available to Ohio voters, even accepting the district court’s focus on the changes wrought by S.B. 238, the removal of Golden Week can hardly be deemed to impose a true “burden” on any person’s right to vote. At worst, it represents a withdrawal or contraction of just one of many conveniences that have generously facilitated voting participation in Ohio. This is especially apparent when Ohio’s voting practices are compared to those of other states. No. 16-3561 Ohio Democratic Party, et al. v. Husted, et al. Page 11 Ohio’s early voting system, as amended by S.B. 238, is one of the more generous in the nation. The State’s 29-day early voting period is currently the tenth-longest among all the states. R. 127-14, Trende Rep. at 10, Page ID 6610. When compared to the thirteen states (including two other states in our circuit, Kentucky and Michigan) that do not permit any early in-person voting days, an Ohioan’s path to voting is open and easy, not burdensome. And S.B. 238’s withdrawal of the convenience of same-day registration is hardly obstructive; it merely brings Ohio into line with thirty-eight other states that require registration before an individual may vote.3 Ironically, if Ohio had never expanded access to absentee ballots in the first place and maintained early voting systems similar to Michigan’s or Kentucky’s (permitting no early inperson voting), it would have avoided this challenge altogether, as well as those addressed in Obama for America, 697 F.3d 423, and our since-vacated preliminary injunction decision in NAACP, 768 F.3d 524. Instead, “it is [Ohio’s] willingness to go further than many States in extending the absentee voting privileges . . . that has provided [plaintiffs] with a basis for arguing that the provisions operate in an invidiously discriminatory fashion to deny them a more convenient method of exercising the franchise.” McDonald, 394 U.S. at 810–11 (emphasis added). It’s as if plaintiffs disregard the Constitution’s clear mandate that the states (and not the courts) establish election protocols, instead reading the document to require all states to maximize voting convenience. Under this conception of the federal courts’ role, little stretch of imagination is needed to fast-forward and envision a regime of judicially-mandated voting by text message or Tweet (assuming of course, that cell phones and Twitter handles are not disparately possessed by identifiable segments of the voting population). The district court ignored Ohio’s national leadership in affording privileged voting opportunities, believing that comparison of Ohio’s early-voting system to that of other states was irrelevant under Anderson-Burdick. We fail to see the merit in wearing blinders. While comparisons with the laws and experience of other states may not be determinative of a challenged law’s constitutionality, to ignore such information as irrelevant is to needlessly forfeit a potentially valuable tool in construing and applying “equal protection of the laws,” a constitutional standard applicable to all the states. Forfeiting such a tool would artificially 3 See Same Day Voter Registration, National Conference of State Legislatures (May 25, 2016), http://www ncsl.org/research/elections-and-campaigns/same-day-registration.aspx. No. 16-3561 Ohio Democratic Party, et al. v. Husted, et al. Page 12 constrict the court’s vision and deny reality: courts routinely examine the burden resulting from a state’s regulation with the experience of its neighboring states. See Blackwell, 462 F.3d at 589 (comparing Ohio’s process for permitting minor political parties to gain access to the general election ballot with numerous other states); Hargett, 791 F.3d at 694–95 (comparing Tennessee’s “access-retention” system broadly to other states); Frank v. Walker, 768 F.3d 744, 745 (7th Cir. 2014) (comparing Wisconsin’s voter-ID statute to Indiana’s). We certainly recognize that different states may offer different justifications for the existence or absence of early in-person voting or same-day registration, and do not suggest that Ohio may escape challenges to election regulations simply by pointing to the least accommodating state and saying, “We do it better.” Rather, we reject the notion that such comparisons are irrelevant, as they provide a contextual basis for determining whether the “burden” said to fall here disproportionately on some African-American voters is properly characterized as non-existent, or minimal, or slight, or limited, or modest, or significant, or enormous, or severe. And besides, Ohio is not simply arguing its practices are better. Instead, State officials are defending a liberal absentee voting practice that facilitates participation by all members of the voting public, including those in “socioeconomically disadvantaged groups,” see R. 117, Opinion at 40, Page ID 6162, of whatever race or ethnic background, in a manner more accommodating than the practices of most other states, by affording a “no-questions-asked” right to an absentee ballot and a litany of ways to use it. Thus, in evaluating the magnitude of the “burden,” we find that elimination of Golden Week is a small part of what remains, objectively viewed, a generous early voting schedule. The notion that S.B. 238’s elimination of same day registration disparately imposes anything more than a “minimal” burden on some African Americans ignores the abundant and convenient alternatives that remain for all Ohioans who wish to vote. Consider the numerous options available to all Ohio voters, including African Americans, to conveniently cast a ballot before Election Day. The State’s use of “no-excuse” absentee ballots provides any interested resident the chance to cast a ballot more than four weeks before Election Day by mail, and more than three weeks before Election Day if a voter prefers to do so in person. Ohio Rev. Code § 3509.01. Moreover, this early in-person voting schedule includes No. 16-3561 Ohio Democratic Party, et al. v. Husted, et al. Page 13 two Saturdays, two Sundays, and ten days when voting is permitted until either 6:00 p.m. or 7:00 p.m.—for voters who are “distrustful of voting by mail,” R. 117, Opinion at 43, Page ID 6165, who are assisted by “Souls to the Polls” initiatives, Page ID 6168, who struggle to find time away from “hourly wage jobs,” Page ID 6162, or who merely prefer to save on postage. And these accommodations are a direct result of the settlement reached in NAACP which was specifically designed to accommodate voters in Ohio’s African-American communities. See R. 127-14, Settlement, Page ID 6775–77. The district court placed inordinate weight on its finding that some African-American voters may prefer voting on Sundays, or avoiding the mail, or saving on postage, or voting after a nine-to-five work day. To the extent S.B. 238 may be viewed as impacting such preferences, its “burden” clearly results more from a “matter of choice rather than a state-created obstacle.” Frank, 768 F.3d at 749. The Equal Protection Clause, as applied under the Anderson-Burdick framework, simply cannot be reasonably understood as demanding recognition and accommodation of such variable personal preferences, even if the preferences are shown to be shared in higher numbers by members of certain identifiable segments of the voting public. We also conclude that the elimination of same-day registration and the resulting need for Ohioans to register and vote on separate occasions is, at most, minimally burdensome. Like voting before Election Day, Ohio also makes registration easy. Registration forms are conveniently distributed throughout its communities at the 88 boards of elections offices as well as many other locations, including “local libraries, at many of the municipal city halls, high schools”—and can even be printed from county websites. R. 97, Perlatti Tr., Page ID 4067.4 And if this isn’t enough, the Secretary of State mailed absentee ballot applications to almost every registered voter in the state in the past two elections and plans to do so in the 2016 election. Id. Thus, even without Golden Week, Ohio’s registration and voting processes afford abundant opportunity for all Ohio voters, of whatever racial or ethnic background, to register and exercise their right to vote. 4 Ohio has also recently passed a law permitting voters to register online, so long as they verify their social security number and input their driver’s license number or identification card number to establish proof of identity. See S.B. 63 (2016) (effective 9/13/2016). No. 16-3561 Ohio Democratic Party, et al. v. Husted, et al. Page 14 It’s no surprise then, that the Supreme Court in Crawford rejected an analogous challenge to an undeniably more burdensome law based on this sort of “burden of making a second trip to vote” argument. The Court held that first going to the Bureau of Motor Vehicles and then casting a ballot was ultimately no more “burdensome” than the usual challenges of voting. Crawford, 553 U.S. at 198–99 (Stevens, J., op.) (the “inconvenience of making a trip to the BMV, gathering the required documents, and posing for a photograph surely does not . . . even represent a significant increase over the usual burdens of voting,” even though “a somewhat heavier burden may be placed on a limited number of persons” including the elderly, the economically disadvantaged, and the homeless). Scrounging up a birth certificate, making a trip to the BMV, and obtaining a photo ID surely cannot be considered less “burdensome” than submitting one of Ohio’s virtually ubiquitous registration cards (which can be mailed back, dropped off in person, or returned by another) and enjoying the convenience of a no-excuse early absentee voting on any one of Ohio’s twenty-nine voting days. Therefore, viewing S.B. 238 objectively under the Anderson-Burdick framework in a manner consonant with the Court’s most recent application of the framework in Crawford, we see a regulation that can only be characterized as minimally burdensome on the right of some African-American voters. Beyond evidence that African Americans may use early in-person voting at higher rates than other voters and may therefore be theoretically disadvantaged by reduction of the early voting period, the record does not establish that S.B. 238—as opposed to non-state-created circumstances—actually makes voting harder for African Americans. Plaintiffs do not point to any individual who, post-S.B. 238, will be precluded from voting. Without sufficient evidence to “quantify either the magnitude of the burden on this narrow class of voters or the portion of the burden that is fully justified,” the Crawford Court refused to accept bare assertions that “a small number of voters . . . may experience a special burden” and instead looked to the statute’s “broad application” to all state voters in concluding that the law imposed “only a limited burden on voters’ rights.” Crawford, 553 U.S. at 200, 202–03 (Stevens, J., op.). The Crawford application of Anderson-Burdick is consistent with our precedent recognizing that broadly applicable and non-discriminatory laws are presumed to pass constitutional muster: “If the State had enacted a generally applicable, nondiscriminatory voting No. 16-3561 Ohio Democratic Party, et al. v. Husted, et al. Page 15 regulation that limited in-person early voting for all Ohio voters, its ‘important regulatory interests’ would likely be sufficient to justify the restriction.” Obama for America, 697 F.3d at 433–34 (quoting Burdick, 504 U.S. at 434);5 see also Washington State Grange v. Washington State Republican Party, 552 U.S. 442, 452 (2008) (“If a statute imposes only modest burdens, however, then the State’s important regulatory interests are generally sufficient to justify reasonable, nondiscriminatory restrictions on election procedures.” (internal quotation marks omitted; emphasis added)). The Crawford Court also recognized, in fact, that it had “applied Anderson’s standard for reasonable, nondiscriminatory restrictions and upheld Hawaii’s prohibition on write-in voting even though it actually prevented a significant number of voters from participating in Hawaii elections in a meaningful manner.” Crawford, 553 U.S. at 190 (Stevens, J., op.) (internal citation and quotation marks omitted; emphasis added). Considering the generally applicable and non-discriminatory nature of S.B. 238 in light of Ohio’s generous absentee voting system, a system which provides extensive opportunities for all voters, including African Americans, to cast their ballots short of coming out on Election Day, we hold that S.B. 238 results only in a minimal burden on African Americans’ right to vote. See Burdick, 504 U.S. at 434–37 (assessing Hawaii’s ban on “write-in” votes for candidates in light of the State’s otherwise “easy access to the ballot”); Ohio Council, 814 F.3d at 335 (holding that ballot restrictions on judicial candidates imposed only minimal burdens on political parties because Ohio law gave parties “many other opportunities to champion [their] nominee[s]”). We therefore reject the district court’s conclusion that S.B. 238 imposes a “modest” burden. We next look to the State’s interests in adopting the regulation. See Crawford, 553 U.S. at 190 (Stevens, J., op.).