Kasich uses his veto pen wisely to block suppression of voting

Should you happen to see Gov. John Kasich dodging volleys of virulent vitriol from his Republican brethren in the Ohio Legislature these days, please rush to his defense. Kasich kerfuffled them by rightly using his veto power to delete an onerous and potentially unconstitutional provision of the state’s 2016-17 $7 billion transportation budget bill.

That provision sought to invoke what amounted to an illegal poll tax on a large bloc of voters, namely the 120,000 out-of-state college students seeking to exercise their franchise while living in one of our many campus communities.

Specifically, the vetoed provision would have required out-of-state college students who register to vote to acquire an Ohio driver’s license and vehicle registration. The practical hassles and the approximate $75 in costs toward that end likely would have discouraged many to exercise their voting rights.

Kasich therefore acted responsibly and fairly by vetoing it. In so doing, the governor made a bold statement against voter suppression and for free and unfettered ballot access. That action merits applause, not boos.

But boo some will. John Fortney, a spokesman for the majority Senate Republican caucus, saw nothing nefarious in the provision. “Quite frankly, any effort to label this as voter suppression or a poll tax is weak political spin,” he said.

RATIONALE FOR ACTION?

But if not to limit voting by a demographic that leans heavily Democratic just in time for the 2016 presidential elections, what was the motivation? No one from the state Bureau of Motor Vehicles or the secretary of state’s office saw a problem with the status quo, which permits college students to register to vote with other proof of temporary residency. On legal grounds, there is no question that college students have the right to vote in the community in which they attend school and live. The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that right in the case of Symm v. United States way back in 1979.

Fifteen years earlier, states ratified the 24th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution outlawing poll taxes, which established that U.S. citizens must never be required to pay to play a legitimate role in our participatory democracy. Critics of the Ohio provision correctly argued that forced driver’s registration — including the costs, testing and administrative hassles associated with it — constituted such obstacles.

Had it been retained in the otherwise strong and promising transportation budget, the measure likely would have opened the floodgates to years of costly and caustic legal challenges that would have put a fresh stain on Ohio’s voter- access image. That would be unfortunate as Secretary of State Jon Husted has made productive inroads in recent years to ensure maximum participation and minimal fraud in this critical swing state in national elections.

Presidential ambitions?

Some cynics charge that Kasich made a public spectacle of his veto merely to further his own presidential ambitions. We fail to buy that argument because this is not the first time that the centrist Republican has bucked his party. Most notably, last year he staunchly supported expansion of Medicaid in Ohio, much to the chagrin and wrath of many in the GOP in Ohio and throughout the nation.

In those and other actions, Kasich has proven he is placing people above politics. That is the correct ranking of priorities for any chief executive of any state or any nation and one that should elicit cheers — not jeers — from constituents.