Court Opinion

ID: 9661630
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 22:45:17.795456+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:31.599431
License: Public Domain

STEPHEN N. LIMBAUGH, JR„ Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
Whatever the deficiencies in the Missouri Voter Protection Act (MVPA), whether real or imagined, the allowance for provisional voting cures all, at least during the two-year transition period before the general election in 2008. Until that time, every person who is properly registered to vote will be allowed to do so, even without a valid photographic identification (photo ID), and indeed, every person who would have been allowed to vote before the enactment of the MVPA will be allowed to do so just as before. Those persons who have no photo ID can cast a provisional ballot using the same, simple means of identification that have been required since 2002, and all provisional ballots properly cast will be counted. In addition, a determination of the constitutionality of the photo ID provisions of the Act as it applies after the two-year transition period is not yet ripe for adjudication, because it may well be that the General Assembly, in the interim, will act to alleviate the perceived deficiencies.
I.
As the majority notes, provisional balloting statutes were first enacted by the General Assembly in 2002 in response to the mandate of the federal “Help America Vote Act,” (HAVA), 42 U.S.C. sec. 15482. HAVA requires that states provide a “fail-safe” procedure for voting so that a person whose registration or identity is challenged can cast a provisional vote that will be counted if it is later determined that the person was indeed entitled to vote. In pertinent part, HAVA states:
(2) The individual shall be permitted to cast a provisional ballot at that polling place upon the execution of a written affirmation by the individual before an election official at the polling place stating that the individual is:
(A) a registered voter in the jurisdiction in which the individual desires to vote; and
(B) eligible to vote in that election.
(3) An election official at the polling place shall transmit the ballot cast by the individual or the voter information contained in the written affirmation executed by the individual under paragraph (2) to an appropriate State or local election official for prompt verification under paragraph (4).
(4) If the appropriate State or local election official to whom the ballot or voter information is transmitted under paragraph (3) determines that the individual is eligible under State law to vote, the individual’s provisional ballot shall be counted as a vote in that election in accordance with State law.
Missouri’s provisional voting statutes are in full accord with HAVA. In particular, section 115.427.13, RSMo Supp.2006, the provisional voting statute that applies to persons who do not present a valid photo *223ID when voting in elections during the two-year transition period, states:
13. For any election held on or before November 1, 2008, an individual who appears at a polling place without identification in the form described in subsection 1 of this section, and who is otherwise qualified to vote at that polling place, may cast a provisional ballot after:
(1) Executing an affidavit which is also signed by two supervising election judges, one from each major political party, who attest that they have personal knowledge of the identity of the voter, provided that the two supervising election judges who sign an affidavit under this subdivision shall not be involved or participate in the verification of the voter’s eligibility by the election authority after the provisional ballot is cast; or
(2) (a) Executing an affidavit affirming his or her identity; and
(b) Presenting a form of identification from the following list:
a. Identification issued by the state of Missouri, an agency of the state, or a local election authority of the state;
b. Identification issued by the United States government or agency thereof;
c. Identification issued by an institution of higher education, including a university, college, vocational and technical school, located within the state of Missouri;
d. A copy of a current utility bill, bank statement, government check, paycheck, or other government document that contains the name and address of the voter; or
e. Driver’s license or state identification card issued by another state.
Such provisional ballot shall be entitled to be counted, provided the election authority verifies the identity of the individual by comparing that individual’s signature to the current signature on file with the election authority and determines that the individual was otherwise eligible to cast a ballot at the polling place where the ballot was cast.
Under the voting laws in effect before the enactment of the MVPA, all regular voters were required to present one of several approved forms of identification, which included certain non-photo IDs. Sec. 115.427.1, RSMo Supp.2002.1 Now, under the transitional provisional voting sections of the MVPA, individuals may still vote by presenting the same forms of non-photo ID that were permitted before the enactment of MVPA — even “a copy of a current utility bill, bank statement, government check-” Sec. 115.427.13. The only difference is that voters who present a form of identification other than an approved photo ID must also sign a simple two-sentence form affidavit available at the polling place swearing to the fact that they are who they say they are. Sec. 115.427.14, RSMo Supp.2006. Then, once the affidavit signature is verified “by comparing that individual’s signature to the current signature on file with the election authority,” the provisional ballot “shall be counted.” This provisional voting procedure of “written affirmation” and “prompt verification” of that affirmation — mandated by HAVA — is no real burden on an individual’s right to vote.
A.
Although the majority makes clear that it is not holding the provisional voting sections unconstitutional, it suggests, none*224theless, that the provisional voting procedures may present a constitutional issue. The stated concern is that “no exception to the signature match requirement is made for Missourians who are unable, because of disability or age, to make a signature or whose signature has changed due to age or the passage of time since they made their original signature when they initially registered to vote.”
Tellingly, the majority cites no authority whatsoever that a signature match requirement is a constitutionally impermissible means to verify a voter’s identity. After all, the signature match requirement was taken directly from the report of the Commission of Federal Election Reform co-chaired by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James A. Baker, Jr. In particular, section 2.5.3 of that report states:
We recommend that until January 1, 2010, states allow voters without a valid photo ID card (Real or EAC-template ID) to vote, using a provisional ballot by signing an affidavit under penalty of perjury. The signature would then be matched with the digital image of the voter’s signature on file in the voter registration database, and if the match is positive, the provisional ballot should be counted....
Except for providing a digital image of the voter’s signature from the voter registration database, the MVPA signature match provisions are exactly the same.
The majority appears particularly troubled by allegations that voters who cannot make a signature will be disenfranchised. However, section 115.427.12, which the majority disavows, adequately addresses that concern. That section provides:
If any voter is unable to sign his name at the appropriate place on the certificate or computer printout, an election judge shall print the name and address of the voter in the appropriate place on the precinct register, the voter shall make his mark in lieu of signature, and the voter’s mark shall be witnessed by the signature of an election judge.
Section 115.427.12 allows voters to sign by mark on the voter’s identification certificate in section 115.427.9, which is the sworn oath confirming the voter’s identity and registration that all voters must sign before receiving a regular ballot. The “mark” provision of section 115.427.12 necessarily applies as well to the provisional voter affidavit because that affidavit is used in lieu of the voter’s identification certificate for those voters casting a provisional ballot under section 115.427.13.2 There are at least three rules of statutory construction that compel this conclusion. First, because these sections relate to the same subject matter, they must be read in pari materia, that is, they must be interpreted harmoniously and consistently with each other. Baldwin v. Director of Revenue, 38 S.W.3d 401, 403 (Mo. banc 2001). Second, these sections must be construed liberally in support of the fundamental right to vote. State ex rel. School Dist. of City of Jefferson, Cole County v. Holman, 349 S.W.2d 945, 947 (Mo. banc 1961). And third, these sections must be construed “in *225light of a strong presumption of a statute’s validity,” and this Court will “make every reasonable intendment” to that end. Reproductive Health Services v. Nixon, 185 S.W.3d 685, 688 (Mo. banc 2006). "When sections 115.427.12 and 115.427.13 are construed in these ways, all voters who cannot make a signature, whether regular or provisional, may make their mark with the assistance of an election judge.
Regardless, the majority still complains that the provisional ballots of voters who sign their ballot affidavits by mark will not be counted because there can be no signature match of a mark. Again, the majority seems unwilling to read these inter-connected voting statutes in pari materia and to construe them liberally in support of the fundamental right to vote and in view of the presumption of constitutionality. In my mind, just as signing by mark is an exception to the signature requirement to prove one’s identity for registering (sec. 115.161) and for voting (sec.115.427.12), so too it is implicitly an exception to the signature match requirement to prove one’s identity for provisional voting. Having allowed voters who cannot make a signature to sign by mark, the General Assembly surely cannot have intended that those persons are nonetheless subject to a signature match. Indeed, to submit voters who sign by mark to a signature match would be an absurd construction of the statute and would lead to the absurd conclusion that their provisional ballots would not be counted. That result, however, would not obtain under the above rules of construction, not to mention the corollary rule of construction that it is presumed “that the legislature did not intend to enact an absurd law.” Care and Treatment of Schottel v. State, 159 S.W.3d 836, 842 (Mo. banc 2005). In these instances I would hold that the identity of a voter who cannot sign by signature is established simply by the mark, the witness thereto, and the presentation of an otherwise approved non-photo ID.
B.
The majority also suggests that provisional voting requirements will not apply in municipal and local elections (as opposed to primary and general elections) because “[t]he only method of determining eligibility of those who cast such provisional ballots is pursuant to section 115.430,” which by its terms, “shall apply to primary and general elections_” However, section 115.427.13 expressly states that an individual appearing without a photo ID may cast a provisional ballot in “any election held on or before November 1, 2008 — ” (emphasis added). That said, section 115.430 is internally inconsistent. On one hand, it states that its provisions “shall apply to primary and general elections,” and, on the other hand, it states that “a voter ... shall be entitled to vote a provisional ballot ... upon executing an affidavit under section 115.427,” which, as noted, allows provisional voting in any election. However, reading these sections in pari materia, the discrepancy may properly be resolved and the statutes harmonized by reference to the fact that section 115.430 was later amended, as part of the MVPA, to relate back to section 115.427, thus expanding the scope of section 115.430 to encompass “any election.” Alternatively, the doctrine of repeal by implication controls. This Court has consistently held that when two statutory provisions are repugnant, “the later act ... operates to the extent of the repugnancy to repeal the first.” Morrow v. City of Kansas City, 788 S.W.2d 278, 281 (Mo. banc 1990). The doctrine has classic application to this case: Because section 115.430 was amended to incorporate section 115.427 and that section’s application to “any election,” the amendment to section 115.430 served to *226repeal by implication section 115.430⅛ limitation to primary and general elections.
C.
Ultimately, the majority disallows the two-year transition provisions not because of the signature match issue or the local and municipal election issue, but instead because the two-year transition provisions are not severable from the permanent provisions that become effective for the November 2008 elections. The controlling authority, section 1.140, RSMo, states as follows:
The provisions of every statute are sev-erable. If any provision of a statute is found by a court of competent jurisdiction to be unconstitutional, the remaining provisions of the statute are valid unless the court finds the valid provisions of the statute are so essentially and inseparably connected with, and so dependent upon, the void provision that it cannot be presumed the legislature would have enacted the valid provisions without the void one; or unless the court finds that the valid provisions, standing alone, are incomplete and are incapable of being executed in accordance with the legislative intent.
As interpreted by this Court, section 1.140 means that all “statutes are presumptively severable.” General Motors Corp. v. Director of Revenue, 981 S.W.2d 561, 568 (Mo. banc 1998).
The majority holds that because the permanent photo ID sections in SB 1014 fail, the two-year transitional provisions must fail as well, as those provisions are “so essentially and inseparably connected with and so dependent upon” the permanent sections. There is no claim, however, that “the valid provisions [the two-year transitional sections] standing alone, are incomplete and are incapable of being executed in accordance with the legislative intent,” and clearly those sections can in fact stand alone and are in fact complete and capable of being executed in accordance with the legislative intent. Instead, the majority claims that “[njothing in SB 1014 suggests that the legislature would have enacted the transitional provisions without the permanent provisions.”
To the contrary, had the General Assembly truly intended the transitional provisions set out in section 115.427.13 to be nonseverable, it would have said so expressly, just as it did in section 115.427.11, a companion section enacted as part of the very same bill, SB 1014. Section 115.427.11, which pertains to the secretary of state’s authority to promulgate administrative rules “to effectuate the provisions of this section [115.427.10]” states-:
Any rule or portion of a rule, as that term is defined in section 536.010, RSMo, that is created under the authority delegated in this section shall become effective only if it complies with and is subject to all of the provisions of chapter 536, RSMo [the Administrative Procedure Act as it relates to the procedures for promulgating administrative rules], and, if applicable, section 536.028, RSMo. This section and chapter 536, RSMo, are NONSEVERABLE .... (emphasis added).
The clear implication of the General Assembly’s express nonseverability declaration is that the other sections, including section 115.427.13, none of which contain such a declaration, remain severable in accordance with the statutory presumption in section 1.140.
Even without that clear implication, there is ample good reason to abide by the statutory presumption. In all likelihood, the General Assembly would have intended for the transitional provisions to be in effect for only two years despite the invalidity of the permanent provisions, because at *227least the voting public would have had the benefit of the photo ID requirement during that time, albeit in a more restricted format. In addition, the transitional provisions, with their allowance for extensive provisional voting, have the apparent purpose to “buy time” for the General Assembly to correct any constitutional infirmities in the permanent provisions of the statute that the courts might discover during the two-year interim period. That contingency, of course, has been borne out in this very case. The majority’s reasoning in this regard, however — that “The transitional provision[s ... are] just that: transitional” — is altogether empty, as it would assign no purpose at all to the transitional provisions. And if the majority is thus unable to identify a purpose to the transitional provisions that would justify overcoming the presumption of severability, then how can it be fairly said that the presumption has been overcome?
In the final analysis, perhaps the best recitation of the notion of severability, and the most accurate capsulization of the words of section 1.140, is found in the jurisprudence of the United States Supreme Court, stated most recently in Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, — U.S. —, 126 S.Ct. 961, 968, 163 L.Ed.2d 812 (2006): “After finding an application or portion of a statute unconstitutional, we must next ask: Would the legislature have preferred what is left of its statute to no statute at all?” In this case, I have no doubt that the legislature’s answer would be a resounding yes.
D.
In sum, I would hold that provisional voting during the transitional two-year period is not constitutionally infirm, that the allowance for provisional voting during that period precludes any legitimate claim of voter disenfranchisement, and that the transitional provisions are severable.
II.
Because the permanent provisions of the MVPA do not take effect until the general election in November of 2008, any decision on the constitutionality of that part of the Act is premature. Relief granted by way of a declaratory judgment is not available “to adjudicate hypothetical or speculative situations which may never come to pass.” State ex rel. Nixon v. American Tobacco Co., Inc., 34 S.W.3d 122, 128 (Mo. banc 2000), citing Farm Bureau Town & Country Ins. Co. v. Angoff, 909 S.W.2d 348, 352 (Mo. banc 1995). Said another way, a declaratory judgment requires a justiciable controversy, which means, in part, that the controversy is ripe for judicial determination. Missouri Health Care Ass’n v. Attorney General of the State of Mo., 953 S.W.2d 617, 620 (Mo. banc 1997). To be ripe, a controversy must be “of sufficient immediacy and reality to warrant the issuance of a declaratory judgment.” Id. at 621. Moreover, a controversy is only ripe “if the parties’ dispute is developed sufficiently to allow the court to make an accurate determination of the facts, to resolve a conflict that is presently existing, and to grant specific relief of a conclusive character.” Id.
Although the majority claims that “Missourians must take action and incur costs now,” it then concedes that the real deadline is a full two years from now. And although the majority is correct that the statute is presently in effect, two years will pass before the parts of the statute the majority finds unconstitutional will be implemented. Until that time, no harm, real or imagined, will come to any voter. In the meantime, however, the evidence on which the trial court based its findings and judgment is subject to significant change. For instance, plaintiffs’ primary griev-*228anee — that the cost of securing birth certificates or other forms of suitable identification in order to obtain a “free” photo ID is an undue burden on the right to vote— may well be satisfactorily addressed by the General Assembly during its upcoming sessions. If so, the trial court and this Court would be hard pressed to maintain that the statute is unconstitutional. Given the two-year transition period, there is no immediacy to the controversy, no possibility for an accurate determination of the facts, and no way to grant relief specific to the alleged harm. To declare the statute unconstitutional under these circumstances is a straightforward violation of the ripeness doctrine.
III.
Although I would not reach the merits of the claim against the permanent provisions of the MVPA due to lack of ripeness, I cannot leave unchallenged the majority’s incomplete recitation of the facts pertaining to the existence of voter fraud and the need for a photo ID system to combat that fraud. According to the majority, there has been no fraud in the polling places; thus no need to prevent it. But the evidence, in part, is this: In an investigative report issued after the 2000 presidential election by outgoing Secretary of State Rebecca McDowell Cook, and introduced in evidence in this case, “135 people who were not registered to vote were permitted to vote at a polling place without a court order and without apparent authorization from [an election] Board Official.” A subsequent report from then Secretary of State Matt Blunt noted, as even the plaintiffs have acknowledged here, that 79 voters registered from vacant lots, 45 people voted twice, and 14 votes were cast by the “dead.” Further, as set out in a pending complaint filed in federal court by the United States Department of Justice against the State of Missouri and cited to the trial court and this Court without objection, there is a stunningly large number of duplicate and ineligible voter registrations throughout the state. According to that portion of the complaint, which is based on government records that are subject to judicial notice,
[A] comparison of State voter registration data posted on the website of the Missouri Secretary of State with data from the United States Census Bureau indicates that at least 34 (nearly one-third) of the election jurisdictions in Missouri had more registered voters in November 2004 than there were persons of voting age in those jurisdictions under July 2003 Census estimates (released September 2004), and that 29 election jurisdictions in the State had more registered voters in November 2004 than there were persons of voting age in those jurisdictions under July 2004 Census estimates (released August 2005). Indeed, the State’s data indicates that the local election jurisdiction with the highest ratio, Reynolds County, had 153% of its 2003 Census voting age population, and 151% of its 2004 Census voting age population, registered to vote in the November 2004 federal election. This State’s data further indicates that, statewide, Missouri had voter registration totals in November 2004 amounting to 98 percent of the state’s voting age population according to July 2003 Census estimates and 96 percent of the state’s voting age population according to July 2004 Census estimates.
Although the majority agrees that there is some evidence of voter fraud at the voter registration stage, they discount that evidence as if it had no connection with fraud at the polling place. But why else does voter registration fraud occur if not to vote persons fraudulently registered? And if, as in the DOJ report, there are more voters registered to vote than persons eligible to vote, the requirement to present a photo ID will at least eliminate those who *229attempt to vote in the place of others and those who attempt to vote more than once. It must be said, too, that even if there were no substantial evidence of existing voter impersonation fraud, legislatures are permitted to respond to the potential for such fraud, and they may do so “with foresight” rather than “reactively.” Munro v. Socialist Workers Party, 479 U.S. 189, 107 S.Ct. 533, 93 L.Ed.2d 499 (1986). In any event, as the Carter-Baker Commission recently concluded, “there is no doubt that [in-person voter fraud] occurs” and that such fraud “could offset the outcome of close elections.”
rv.
For the foregoing reasons, I would reverse the judgment of the trial court.3

. In the alternative, if the voters were known to the supervising election judges, they need not have presented an ID but were required to swear out an affidavit attested to by those election judges. Sec. 115.427.1, RSMo Supp. 2002.

. The majority's assertion in footnote 8 that the signature to be made on the provisional ballot is "an additional signature” to that which "must be made on the precinct register” appears to be incorrect. Persons who appear at a polling place and who do not have an approved identification need not sign the oath on the "Voter’s Identification Certificate,” but proceed directly to provisional voting by executing an affidavit affirming his or her identity stating, "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that my name is_; that I reside at _; and that I am the person listed in the precinct register under this name and at this address.” Sec. 115.427.13, 14.

. Like the majority, I would not address plaintiff's Hancock claims at this time because, although the trial court made certain findings in favor of plaintiffs, it entered judgment in favor of defendants and plaintiffs did not file a cross-appeal.