Lola and I wander down to campus to take a look at the annual Kites on Ice event. It is a gray overcast day with light winds but there were a dozen or so big kites that managed to get up into the air over Lake Mendota. With this February thaw in progress, however, it was more like Kites on Slush. We size up the scene for about half an hour then wander up State Street doing casual browsing in the stores and watching our fellow citizens. Lola buys chocolates and we eat a few over coffee before coming back home to watch the Super Bowl.
There is a lot of talk going on in Wisconsin about how we citizens should regulate our voting. I would argue that regulation of voting is the most important responsibility of State Government. It is a responsibility more important than providing protection, more important than providing education, more important than building roads or interfering with normal commerce. How we vote goes to the core of what makes us Americans.
I actually believe Justice Stephen Breyer makes the case eloquently: “… the whole theory of our country is that power originates in the people and whatever power government has is delegated by those people; while in many foreign countries, even if they end up at the same place, it has been liberty that has initially been granted by a central power, whether it started out as a king or even a democratic government. … At bottom, there is reflected a very strong American belief that all power has to flow from the people and we have to maintain a check. That's a good thing.”[1] How we vote goes to the core of what makes us Americans because this is the method by which a collection of individual citizens freely transfers power to a government.
There is a push within the Wisconsin Legislature to require that people provide a photo ID to establish proof of identity before being allowed to vote. This strikes me as resonable, desirable and a needed improvement even if it is not a perfect fix for all the problems in our election system. I once worked for a surgeon whose favorite saying was: “perfection is the enemy of good”. If all you take are good steps you may never get to perfection but you will keep moving towards the goal. The goal for Wisconsin needs to be making voting accurate first, then easy second. There is no fairness or justice unless there is first an accurate reflection of the public will.
[1] Transcript of Discussion Between U.S. Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Stephen Breyer – American University Washington College of Law, Jan. 13, 2005
There is a lot of talk going on in Wisconsin about how we citizens should regulate our voting. I would argue that regulation of voting is the most important responsibility of State Government. It is a responsibility more important than providing protection, more important than providing education, more important than building roads or interfering with normal commerce. How we vote goes to the core of what makes us Americans.
I actually believe Justice Stephen Breyer makes the case eloquently: “… the whole theory of our country is that power originates in the people and whatever power government has is delegated by those people; while in many foreign countries, even if they end up at the same place, it has been liberty that has initially been granted by a central power, whether it started out as a king or even a democratic government. … At bottom, there is reflected a very strong American belief that all power has to flow from the people and we have to maintain a check. That's a good thing.”[1] How we vote goes to the core of what makes us Americans because this is the method by which a collection of individual citizens freely transfers power to a government.
There is a push within the Wisconsin Legislature to require that people provide a photo ID to establish proof of identity before being allowed to vote. This strikes me as resonable, desirable and a needed improvement even if it is not a perfect fix for all the problems in our election system. I once worked for a surgeon whose favorite saying was: “perfection is the enemy of good”. If all you take are good steps you may never get to perfection but you will keep moving towards the goal. The goal for Wisconsin needs to be making voting accurate first, then easy second. There is no fairness or justice unless there is first an accurate reflection of the public will.
[1] Transcript of Discussion Between U.S. Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Stephen Breyer – American University Washington College of Law, Jan. 13, 2005
