The ruling in federal court in Washington, D.C. Wednesday upholding South Carolina Photo I.D. law includes some flexibility. The ruling does not allow the law to take effect until 2013 and even then those without a photo ID may still cast a ballot that must be counted.
In their ruling, the three judges said repeatedly that the new law – as state officials propose to enact it – does not require voters to have a photo ID. “(The law) allows citizens with non-photo voter registration cards to still vote without a photo ID so long as they state the reason for not having obtained one,” the judges wrote. Among the acceptable reasons for not having a photo ID are having to work, being unemployed and looking for a job, lacking transportation to a state office, the cost of that travel, child or family issues, lacking a birth certificate, disability or illness, a religious objection or being “busy with my charitable work,” the decision said.
“Any reason asserted by the voter … for not having a photo ID must be accepted,” unless false, and the voter’s “ballot counted.”
