ELECTIONATE JULY 16, 2012
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The possibility that new voter-ID laws could disenfranchise thousands of Democratic- voters in pivotal swing states has received considerable attention recently. After all, 9.2 percent of registered voters in Pennsylvania lack photo identification, including 18 percent of registered voters in heavily Democratic Philadelphia. But these flashy numbers might be misleading. If voter-ID laws have consequences for voter turnout, they’re difficult to detect.
Several studies conducted in the wake of the 2006 midterms showed a weak correlation between tougher voter-ID laws and reduced turnout. Nate Silver has usefully summarized the data and explained the difficulty of interpreting it well, but I thought I’d flag a chart from a study by Robert Erikson and Lorraine Minnite that has stuck with me:
As you can see, the correlation depends on only a few data points, which undermines the practical significance of the findings if states are influenced by other factors. For instance, states implementing voter-ID laws were relatively Republican; that's significant, since 2006 was a decidedly Democratic year. The entire correlation turns on South Dakota (imagine the best fit line if turnout had increased by 6 percent in South Dakota), but the overwhelmingly white state had a hotly contested Senate race in 2002 between Tim Johnson and John Thune, drawing multiple visits from President Bush. The race was decided by just 524 votes. In 2006, the closest race was the gubernatorial contest—the governor won by 16 points. If the contests were flipped between 2002 and 2006, would turnout have decreased by six percent in lily-white South Dakota due to voter ID laws? I doubt it, but it can’t be proven. The bottom line: If voter-ID laws do meaningful reduce turnout, the sample is not yet good enough to withstand scrutiny.
Perhaps more importantly, studies conducted based on the 2006 midterms miss the two most relevant data points. Between 2004 and 2008, Indiana and Georgia became the first two states to require voters to provide photo identification—precisely the type of law at issue in Pennsylvania and elsewhere. 2004 and 2008 were presidential election years, which would tend to offer better intrastate comparisons than midterm election years, when state turnout is primarily shaped by local elections. That’s especially true in Georgia, where the Obama campaign made a modest effort to compete in a state quite similar to North Carolina and Virginia, two other solid-Bush states that Obama contested due to a large and untapped African American voting bloc. The other southern states with large African American populations represent points for comparison in the other direction.
So did laws requiring photo identification suppress African American turnout in Georgia in 2008? If it did, any consequences were overwhelmed by enthusiasm for Obama's historic candidacy. According to the exit polls, African American turnout increased more in Georgia than any other competitive state, including North Carolina and Virginia. According to the CNN exit polls, African Americans represented 30 percent of the Georgia electorate, up from 25 percent in 2004. In absolute terms, more than 350,000 additional African Americans voted—a 42 percent increase. The exit polls also suggest that the increase in African American turnout was more modest in Virginia and North Carolina, although it is worth noting that Georgia’s black population grew more over the last decade, giving Obama a larger pool of potential new voters. The exit poll numbers are imperfect, but it is difficult to contest that Georgia saw African American voter turnout rise to an extent greater than or equal to similar states.
On the other hand, overall turnout grew at a slower pace in Georgia than Virginia or North Carolina after adjusting for population growth. The increase in turnout was more comparable to Alabama, Mississippi, and South Carolina than the two Mid-Atlantic battlegrounds. Which is a better analogue to semi-competitive Georgia—the uncompetitive Deep South states, or the extremely competitive Mid-Atlantic states? Unfortunately, there isn't a definitive answer. The Obama campaign made a concerted effort to register voters in Georgia, unlike the uncompetitive states in the Deep South. But the Obama campaign largely suspended advertising by September, and I suspect that Georgia voters didn't think that their votes might decide the contest.
Someone could squint at the numbers and argue that Georgia turnout looks a little less than it ought to be, and that same person might also observe that a 2-to-3 percent drop-off among registered voters predicted by most studies would cover the gap. That might seem simple enough were it not for the surge in African American turnout. If African American turnout in Georgia increased to the extent suggested by the exit polls, then the slower increase in overall turnout is almost entirely attributable to white voters. That’s just not the effect predicted by opponents of voter-ID, and it suggests that other forces were at play, as was the case in lily-white South Dakota.
Even if photo ID did reduce turnout among Democratic-leaning groups, Obama performed as expected in Georgia and Indiana: The final polls were dead-on. If voters were turned away at the polls, it wasn’t enough to sway the results. Potential voters might have dissuaded due to their lack of identification, but since the polls were accurate, they must not have been included in polls of likely voters. For that same reason, the pre-election polls should remain accurate in 2012.
If voter identification requirements suppressed Democratic turnout in Georgia or Indiana, the effects were not readily observable in the final results. African American turnout surged in Georgia, the polls were dead-on, and Obama improved more over Kerry in Indiana than any other state of the continental forty-eight. None of this demonstrates that voter ID requirements do not have a disparate impact on minority voters, nor can it preclude the possibility that Obama would have done better without photo identification requirements. But it does suggest that voter ID laws are unlikely to sway the results of a national election. And if they do, we might not know for sure.
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10 comments
Ok, you give some good reasons for Democrats to exhale. But what your theory to explain these counter-intuitive observations? I say 'counter-intuitive' because on the face of it, it is hard to understand how, in a state like PA, excluding enough likely-Democratic voters to make up 9% of the total registered-voter population could not affect the outcome. The theories most plausible to me are these: ->Though registered to vote, the people these laws exclude from the polls are very low-frequency voters. In other words, while the laws are quite clearly aimed at Democratic voter suppression, they succeed mainly at non-voter voter suppression. It makes sense. If you lack government-issued photo ID you are, almost by definition, a non-driver. I'd like to see some numbers on voter turnout among non-drivers who are registered to vote. Given that across these United States the automobile is the mode of transport overwhelmingly favored for getting out to the polls on chilly November mornings, I'd bet that with or without voter ID laws, the non-driver vote is already heavily suppressed. ->The statistics on the number of registered voters without photo ID are inflated.
- AaronW
July 16, 2012 at 3:07pm
How many state IDs with photos on them are give out for free? Given this, does this not amount to a poll tax?
- Nari224
July 16, 2012 at 4:05pm
Isn't it time for us to have serious ID cards? Perhaps tattooed on us, both for the convenience of voter officials and for police officers?
- skahn
July 16, 2012 at 4:55pm
Little chips, like the ones we implant in our pets, would do the trick, skahn. BTW, they're coming.
- magboy47.
July 16, 2012 at 11:11pm
Ok. First as a left of center democrat, I don't think the idea of requiring someone to show a photo ID at their polling place is wrong or can be construed as a 'poll tax' as some people on the left would like us to believe. I also don't think we face the threat of massive voter fraud from people voting without IDs as those on the Right would like us to believe. Every state I've lived in and voted in - CO, VA, MD, LA, when I go to get my driver's license I register to vote and most polling places asked for an ID to use as a check against their polling logs. I don't see how anyone in this day and age, in America would not have some form of photo ID. A driver's license costs $20. A state photo ID less than that. What's the big deal? Are people so sensitive that they feel insulted that someone at the polling center asks them for an ID to confirm 1) they are indeed Johnny Rotten and 2) voting at the appropriate place. I don't think for presidential elections, one has to have a place of residence (so to speak) within the district you're voting for because that disenfranchises college students, migrant workers, and homeless. Look, if you lived in some town for 40 years, you should have an ID. I don't buy the argument that requiring some form of ID is a poll tax because it's not as if you have to pay every time you vote. A photo ID is pretty much required to do many of the transactions we participate in daily anyway. How could a person not have a valid I.D.? The ID is good for several years so the cost is not undue and if you truly can't afford the fee (homeless for example) then at least we provide a subsidy for those who can't afford the ID. What I do have an issue with, is the fact that most of the GOP voter ID laws and voting reform laws are structured in such a way to disenfranchise people that may not live (permanently in that district) from voting. That means college students cannot vote in the state where they attend college even though they live there, spend money there, pay taxes there. The GOP loathes the idea of liberal college students swaying the outcome of local politics (but certainly don't mind when out-of-state billionaires and corporations push their own laws and candidates in a local race). How does one fix that? Pass a law that for Federal elections, a person can vote wherever they happen to be standing at the time? Is there a minimum residency standard? 2, 4, or 6 months? Obama can't very well promote a national voter ID card for Americans because the minute he did that, the GOP and Right wing nuts would claim it's another example of the socialist-crony-capitalist-Kenyan-marxist Obama trying to make everyone a slave to the Federal Government and turn us into some sort of Big Gummint control Gestapo-police state. But if the GOP propose it, well, we're just protecting America from the voting uncertainty of having an illegal immigrant vote for a Democrat and we can't have that now can we?
- singlspeed
July 17, 2012 at 10:36am
I'd like to add a final thought. IF anything, Democrats should encourage folks to go get a State photo ID and register to vote. Heck, set up booths to do both at the same time. That would kill two birds with one stone and the GOP wouldn't have legs to stand on at that point.
- singlspeed
July 17, 2012 at 10:40am
How can any analysis based on the 2008 election--a game-changing scenario that can never be repeated--possibly produce any valid results on the question of the effect of recently enacted voter ID laws? Answer: They can't. Next question: So is this article fundamentally misleading or what?
- mlottman
July 17, 2012 at 1:27pm
If there isn't a perceived political advantage to introducing them, why did a number of GOP controlled states do so? It's not like it was an effective wedge or that there was some swell of public support for the laws prior to their being trotted out.
- Nari224
July 18, 2012 at 3:41pm
This issue is a total loser for Dems. You're arguing that people who can't get it together to prove who they are even to the degree required to cash a welfare check should get to decide who runs the government. This is essentially an argument for voter fraud. Good luck with that. If party activists can't even organize this for prospective voters they deserve to lose.
- Robert Powell
July 19, 2012 at 10:40pm
RP- Do you recognize how reminscent your argument is of the arguments that were made in support of the poll taxes such as the one at issue in Harper v. Virginia? I can easily see the argument being made that "you're arguing that people who can't get it together enough to pay $1.50 to vote should get to decide who runs the government." If we are going to start making decisions regarding who from among otherwise constitutionally eligible voters should be permitted to decide who runs the government, it's going to radically change our form of "self-governance," isn't it? Dhurtado
- NR143296
July 22, 2012 at 12:39pm