Court Opinion

ID: 9634052
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 12:19:34.002097+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:28:56.007899
License: Public Domain

WEST, District Judge
(dissenting):
I must respectfully dissent from the majority decision in this case to force *716the State of Louisiana to provide assistance to illiterates in the voting booth, in the actual casting of their votes, and to force the State of Louisiana to permit Federal observers to go into the voting booth with an illiterate voter and watch him vote because I sincerely believe they are wrong — dead wrong.
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 simply does not provide for such assistance, nor does it in any way authorize a Federal observer to watch a person cast his vote. Section 8 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 42 U.S.C.A. § 1973f provides:
“Whenever an examiner is serving under this Act in any political subdivision, the Civil Service Commission may assign, at the request of the Attorney General, one or more persons, who may be officers of the United States, (1) to enter and attend at any place for holding an election in such subdivision for the purpose of observing whether persons who are entitled to vote are being permitted to vote, and (2) to enter and attend at any place for tabulating the votes cast at any election held in such subdivision for the purpose of observing whether votes cast by persons entitled to vote are being properly tabulated. Such persons so assigned shall report to an examiner appointed for such political subdivision, to the Attorney General, and if the appointment of examiners has been authorized pursuant to section 3(a), to the court.” (Emphasis added.)
Thus, the function of the Federal observer is clearly defined, i. e., to observe whether persons who are entitled to vote are being permitted to vote and to observe whether votes cast by persons entitled to vote are being properly tabulated. By the express terms of the Act, the observers are allowed to enter only the “place for holding an election” and the “place for tabulating the votes cast.” They are not authorized under any circumstances by this Act to enter the voting booth itself, nor to go behind the curtain of a voting machine, while a person is casting his vote.
Section 14(c) (1), 42 U.S.C.A. § 19731 (c) (1) provides:
“The terms ‘vote’ or ‘voting’ shall include all action necessary to make a vote effective * * * including * * * easting a ballot, and having such ballot counted properly and included in the appropriate totals of votes cast * * *.”
Thus, when a person, whether literate or illiterate, is properly registered to vote, without discrimination, and then permitted, without hindrance or discrimination, to enter the voting booth and cast his vote as he sees fit, and when his vote, however cast, is included in the totals of votes cast, he has been allowed to “effectively” cast his vote. He is entitled to no more, and the Voting Rights Act guarantees him no more. The illiterate voter is no more entitled under the Voting Rights Act to assistance within the voting booth than is the literate voter who might like some last minute assistance in making up his mind for whom to vote. The majority order in this case inserts into the Voting Rights Act that which Congress did not see fit to include. This Court has no authority whatsoever to so enlarge the provisions of the Act. At the risk of the suggestion being taken seriously, I must point out that if it is proper for this Court to order the State of Louisiana to furnish such assistance to illiterate voters who have been registered under the Act in order to make their vote “effective”, then it might also be considered in order for the Court, if requested to do so, to order the State of Louisiana to furnish transportation to the polls for those illiterates who have been registered to vote under the Act but who, because of their inability to read the newspaper, are unable to determine where their voting place is located. For how can their vote be “effective” under the majority’s interpretation of the word, if they cannot, without assistance, get to the voting place, and if such assistance is denied?
If the illiterate voter is entitled to such assistance inside the voting booth, why *717should not the literate voter be entitled to have a commissioner go inside the voting booth with him if he so desires to explain what some thirty or forty constitutional amendments are all about so that he may “effectively” cast his vote. The answer is simple. Such assistance is not riecessary in order to make one’s vote “effective.” A person’s vote is “effective” when cast, even though he may have voted for the wrong candidate. It is effective simply because, when counted, it adds one more vote to the total received by the candidate for whom he voted.
The Voting Rights Act was ostensibly intended by Congress to eliminate what it believed to be discrimination practiced in certain localities whereby certain elements of the population, even though qualified, were not allowed to register or to vote. No one can successfully argue against this noble purpose. To prohibit qualified persons from voting is both undemocratic and reprehensible. But in its zeal to protect the rights of qualified voters, Congress enacted the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which, despite United States Supreme Court pronouncements to the contrary, I sincerely believe to be totally and completely unconstitutional. I believe that it is unconstitutional even when its operation is confined to the provisions contained therein. But when, as done here by the majority of this Court, its ambit is extended to include areas clearly beyond anything intended or provided by Congress in the Act, its unconstitutionality is not only apparent but it is glaring. This Court is, of course, bound by the pronouncements of the United States Supreme Court. But it has no right whatsoever to usurp the power of Congress to legislate, and that is exactly what I believe it has done in this instance.
State law in Louisiana specifically denies assistance to illiterate voters in casting their ballot. This is not in conflict with the clear provisions of the Voting Rights Act, and thus there is no occasion to invoke the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution. The Voting Rights Act only nullifies such State laws as are in conflict therewith, and since the Voting Rights Act does not provide for assistance to illiterates inside the voting booth, the State law specifically denying such assistance is not in conflict with Federal law. Louisiana employs the system of identifying all candidates and issues on the voting machine by assigning numbers thereto. This is for the express purpose of making it possible for voters to acquaint themselves with numbers rather than with names and thus simplifying the voting process. These numbers are widely publicized by candidates and newspapers and all other news media and all voters are urged to vote by number. Even the most illiterate voter may determine ahead of time the numbers of the candidates for whom he wishes to vote and bring a sample ballot with him into the voting booth, and thus eliminate the need for assistance inside of the voting booth. The right of illiterates to have assistance in the actual casting of their ballot was specifically eliminated by the State of Louisiana in 1952 as a part of a reform movement to eliminate crooked elections. It has worked, and it should be allowed to continue to work. The position taken by the majority of the Court in this case sets the State of Louisiana back fourteen years and once again opens the door to fraudulent elections, to say nothing of the fact that it puts the long-cherished secrecy of the ballot in serious jeopardy. The Voting Rights Act of 1965, in my opinion, constitutes invidious discrimination against the six or seven states affected by its provisions, and the order of this Court adds materially to that discrimination. And even if it were conceded that the Voting Rights Act requires such assistance to illiterate voters, as the majority of this Court has decreed, it then necessarily follows that such a requirement must result in the most invidious kind of discrimination against the illiterate voters in all of the forty-three or forty-four states not affected by the Voting Rights Act who may not, under the laws of their particular state, be en*718titled to such assistance. And, if it is necessary, in order to make the vote of an illiterate “effective”, to have a Federal observer watch him vote, then the order of this Court is obviously discriminatory because it only authorizes observers in the six parishes wherein Federal examiners are located, thus, apparently making the vote of illiterates in the remaining fifty-seven parishes of the State “ineffective” because of the absence of Federal observers. There is simply no way to square this type of discrimination with the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution, to say nothing of its obvious .conflict with the Tenth Amendment. I must, for these reasons, respectfully dissent from the opinion of the majority in this case.