Voting as a Tool of Inequality

Today is what I’ll call Chapter 3 ongoing (and too sporadic) series on “Hidden Structures that Create and Maintain Gross Inequality”.

The first two posts in the series were about Stepped-Up Basis and Carried Interest (both arcane tax laws that perpetuate redistribution of wealth upwards with no apparent economic reasoning other than that rich people have undue influence on making the laws in our country).

It’s a long one today, so buckle up.

Today’s post is on voting. It’s a subject that may not seem like an issue that contributes to gross inequality, but under the hood, it’s a humdinger.

HISTORY OF VOTING RIGHTS

To start, let’s take a refresher look at where/how voting is mentioned in the Constitution.

• Article I, Section 2, Clause 1. “The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States…”. This clause establishes that members of the House of Representatives are chosen “by the People of the several States.

• Article I, Section 4, Clause 1. “The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.” This clause gives states the authority to regulate elections but allows Congress to alter those regulations.

• Article II, Section 1, Clause 2. “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors…” This clause describes how electors are chosen for the Electoral College (presidential elections).

• 14th Amendment), Section 2. “But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States… the basis of representation therein shall be reduced…” While this Amendment does not directly grant the right to vote, it sets a penalty for states that deny voting rights to certain male citizens.

• 15th Amendment (1870). “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” This amendment obviously prohibits denying the right to vote based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

• 19th Amendment (1920). “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.” This amendment obviously prohibits denying the right to vote based on sex.

• 23rd Amendment (1961). “The District constituting the seat of Government of the United States shall appoint in such manner as the Congress may direct: A number of electors of President and Vice President…” This amendment grants Washington, D.C. participation in presidential elections.

• 24th Amendment (1964). “The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged… by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.” This amendment prohibits poll taxes in federal elections.

• 26th Amendment (1971). “The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged… on account of age.” This amendment lowers the voting age to 18.

Notice something? The Constitution originally did not explicitly guarantee a universal right to vote (probably because the Founding Fathers, while enlightened enough to, well, found the United States, were also culturally racist, sexist and “wealthist”. I made up a new word - “wealthist” - I like it!). Instead, the Constitution left most voting qualifications to the states, and later amendments restricted states from denying voting rights for specific reasons.

Notice something else? The original Constitution made no mention of limiting voting to citizens of the United States. Article 1, Section 2 refers to “People” voting for the House of Representatives, but not citizens. However, Amendments 14, 15, 19, 24 and 26 all refer to the “right of citizens” when it comes to voting. , Thus, the Constitution has been interpreted to allow only citizens to vote.

LET’S DISPENSE WITH THE VOTER FRAUD ARGUMENT

Voter fraud in the United States is basically does not exist. As the Brennan Center for Justice writes, “It is more likely that an American “will be struck by lightning than that he will impersonate another voter at the polls.” You can read their report HERE.

In another report titled “Debunking the Voter Fraud Myth”, the Brennan Center points out that studies show that voter fraud might occur at a rate of between .0003% and .0025%. That’s between 3 and 25 voters per million voters. Other studies show an even lower occurrence. In Wisconsin in 2024, local election clerks referred 46 suspected fraud/irregularity cases out of 3.4 million ballots cast — about 0.0014%. In Iowa in 2024, a state review found 35 noncitizens voted out of about 1.6 million ballots - about .0022%.

USING VOTING TO PERPETUATE INEQUALITY

You knew this would come down to money in politics, right?

Let’s revisit the 24th Amendment, which prohibits a “poll tax or other tax” in federal elections. From Wikipedia (for easy understanding): “The ratification of the 24th Amendment was followed by the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, to which section 10 empowered the United States Attorney General to bring lawsuits to enjoin poll taxes in State and local elections.^[2] Finally, in Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections (1966), the Supreme Court held that poll taxes violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.”

During the Jim Crow era in the South (it’s always the south, isn’t it?), elected officials did everything they could to put obstacles in front of certain voters (read: black people) to stop them from voting. This included a direct tax in order to register to vote (which usually included a provision called a “grandfather clause” which “which allowed any adult male whose father or grandfather had voted in a specific year prior to the abolition of slavery to vote without paying the tax”. Combined with literacy tests and outright intimidation, the end result was very effective in reducing “unwanted” citizens (read: black people) from voting. Simply put, poll taxes made it harder for poor people and people with less means to vote.

Next, let’s look at money in politics. As we all know it has become prohibitively expensive to run for office, especially at the federal level. Candidates have to be independently wealthy or raise millions of dollars in order to run AND be competitive.

Two quick stories to illustrate this:

STORY #1

As I’ve previously written, in my first race for U.S. House, I had finally gotten an audience with the Chair of the DCCC, Rahm Emmanuel. We had never met. After being forced to wait in his office for 45 minutes (a pretty transparent power play in my view), he walked in, didn’t even bother to shake my hand, and sat down behind his desk. The first words out of his mouth were, “Are you a self-funder?” Essentially, the first and most important aspect of my viability as a candidate to him and the establishment was the size of my personal bank accounts (for what it’s worth, my answer was, “I can put in a few bucks, but I’m not going to jeopardize my family’s future and my kids’ education on this campaign. I’ll raise what I have to.”). He then laid down the law: “If you are competitive in the polls, have a media plan that we approve, and raise $xx million, we might consider supporting you in the last couple of months of the cycle.”

STORY #2

After Trump was elected, my two boys - now grown into young adults - essentially told me I had to run again since I was the only Democrat who had come close in a federal election in my state in many years. I had been out of politics for several years, working in the private sector. When I decided to run, as usual, I formed a campaign committee. The initial amount of funds in that committee was… $0. Zero. Nada. Zilch. My incumbent opponent, on the other hand, had amassed a multi-million-dollar war chest during their time in office. No matter what I did during the campaign, I would never have the financial resources to match my opponent. Our system effectively penalizes non-incumbent candidates who want to move from private life to public service simply because non-incumbent candidates have not been spending their time raising money from wealthy donors/corporations.

Over the years, Republican elected officials and conservative Supreme Courts have eroded restrictions on money in politics and campaigns. After Watergate in the early 1970s, Congress passed the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1974 to:

• Set limits on individual contributions to candidates

• Set limits on campaign spending

• Limit independent expenditures

• Create the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to enforce campaign finance laws

• Require extensive public disclosure of campaign contributions and expenditures

• Establish public financing for presidential elections

However, in Buckley vs. Valeo in 1976, SCOTUS nonsensically ruled that money = speech (really? so billionaires have exponentially more speech than working stiffs?). then, in Citizen United vs. the Federal Election Commission in 2010, SCOTUS ruled that corporations (artificial entities created by statute, mentioned nowhere in the Constitution, and which cannot vote) have a First Amendment right to make political donations. Insane.

The end result was Elon Musk contributing over $200 million in the 2024 election cycle and corporations secretly flooding Super PACS with billions of dollars.

THE SPECIOUS “SAVE ACT”

Republicans are currently trying to ram through the SAVE Act, one of the most vicious and anti-American voter suppression bills ever introduced by congress. It requires:

• Presenting a passport or birth certificate in order to register and at the polls in order to vote (yes - a good ‘ole-fashioned poll tax because passports and obtaining original birth certificates costs money); drivers licenses don’t count

• Women - and others which may, ironically, include JD Vance - who have changed their name after marriage need documents to prove who they originally were and who they now are (poll tax)

• Disallow online and mail-in voter registration by states that want to offer it (federalizing elections)

• Might disallow mail-in voting altogether (federalizing elections; poll tax - forcing voters to spend time and money to vote in person)

• States must use inaccurate DHS databases to purge voter rolls of supposedly ineligible voters (federalizing elections)

POLITICAL MESSAGING