Indiana high court hears arguments on voter ID law

By CARLY EVERSON,Associated Press Writer

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana Supreme Court justices hearing arguments in the latest lawsuit over the state's voter identification law on Thursday questioned why no victims were listed as plaintiffs.



The justices did most of the talking during the one-hour oral arguments that were the latest in a string of lawsuits related to the politically charged issue of whether the 2005 law requiring voters to show a photo ID at the polls is unconstitutional.



The League of Women Voters argued that the law violates the state constitution because it imposes a requirement on some voters but not all. They noted that absentee voters aren't required to prove their identity.



The state appeals court agreed in 2009 and threw out the law, but that ruling was later vacated by a federal lawsuit and the ID requirement remains in place. The Supreme Court will decide whether to uphold the appeals court ruling or take up the matter further.



During Thursday's arguments, Justice Frank Sullivan Jr. noted that the law has been in effect through several elections and yet no people who have been affected are named in the lawsuit.



"You standing before us without a single person who has been impinged upon makes it hard to call this grossly unreasonable," he said.



Karen Celestino-Horseman, the attorney representing the League of Women Voters, said people have been hurt by the law and they could testify if the court decides to take up the matter.



"We had individuals who have veteran's benefits cards, and they couldn't vote," she said. "They weren't able to get the ID. One of them, it took a state representative and a volunteer to go with them to the BMV to get the ID. Not everyone has those resources."



Celestino-Horseman was just getting into her 30 minutes of allotted argument time when justices started tossing questions at her.



Sullivan was the first to cut in, asking whether the voter law had uncovered any instances of voter fraud. Horseman said it hadn't and launched briefly back into her argument before Sullivan cut in with more questions. He asked why Secretary of State Todd Rokita was named as the defendant in this case, when Rokita advises on voting laws but isn't responsible for enforcing them, and why the plaintiffs used a different configuration of defendants and plaintiffs than in their previous suit.



Justice Robert Rucker called the case a "facial challenge," as opposed to an application of the law, because there are no plaintiffs in the suit denied the right to vote. The burden of proof is higher in this type of case, Rucker said.



Rokita said the lack of named plaintiffs is telling.



"As the justices themselves observed on several occasions, not one actual plaintiff has been presented who claims to have been denied the right to vote because of our photo ID requirement," he said in a statement after the hearing. "Now that nine elections have been conducted under this law, it is more than safe to say that the photo ID requirement achieves election integrity without sacrificing voter access."



The state's attorney, Solicitor General Thomas Fisher, argued that the voter identification law makes elections more modern, secure and honest.



Another key issue is whether exemptions to the photo ID requirement for mail-in voters are inequitable. Justice Theodore Boehm asked Fisher whether the ID requirement was just part of the election procedure or a qualification to vote, as property ownership once was, which would make it unconstitutional. Fisher said it was more a procedure.



But no former precedents say regulation can't become a qualification if the regulation poses a burden, Celestino-Horseman said in her rebuttal.



Fisher said the difficulties have been overstated by the law's opponents and that other lawful voting regulations necessarily impose some burdens.



"Voting is a right not just to be given to the many," Celestino-Horseman said after the hearing. "It's to be given to the all."

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