The American Civil Liberties Union has been involved in more cases before the United States Supreme Court than any other institution except the government. We defend people’s rights in court every day, so we’re not surprised when people ask us for legal advice. In the past weeks, the ACLU of Maine has received numerous questions from college students and staff wanting to know, “Do students have the right to vote?”
The answer is yes, and it has been yes for more than 100 years. It is alarming that anyone would suggest otherwise. However, the road to securing voting rights for students has been a long one.
In 1882, the town of Waterville denied George Sanders the right to vote because of his status as a college student in the town. Sanders sued the town, and the Maine Supreme Judicial Court awarded him $25 in damages for being denied his legal right to vote. The court found that students, including George Sanders, could not be denied the right to vote based on their educational status.
This principle hasn’t changed in more than 100 years. Students have the right to vote where they attend school.
There have been challenges to students’ right to vote along the way. In 1972, the Gorham Board of Registration refused to register students to vote from the University of Maine at Gorham. This time, the parties settled before the suit reached the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, and students were allowed once again to register and vote.
In 1979, a Texas registrar asked students attending a predominantly black college to complete a questionnaire, which included invasive questions about their residency, property ownership and employment status. A lower federal court ruled that requiring students to complete the questionnaire resulted in unequal treatment with respect to those who were able to register and, thus, unlawfully abridged the students’ right to vote. The
U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the lower court’s decision in the case of Symm v. United States (1979).
It isn’t the voting registrar’s business where you are employed, whether you own property, or whether you pay taxes because those issues –- property ownership, taxation, employment –- have nothing to do with the right to vote.
In summary, all legal precedents in Maine and before the United States Supreme Court uphold the right of students to vote. You do not need a voter ID to vote in Maine. Maine has same-day voter registration. You can register on Election Day and vote.
Students have exactly the same rights and obligations under Maine law as all other eligible voters. And directing overt or implied threats about criminal enforcement of other laws to students looking to vote is coercive and misleading, at the least.
Last year, Secretary of State Charlie Summers sent a threatening letter to the homes of parents of more than 200 students attending school in Maine. He enclosed a form designed to “unenroll” students. The ACLU received numerous calls from parents and students alike. We advised them that they have the legal right to vote where they live. Scared of prosecution, more than 100 students decided to fill out the unenrollment form anyway, deciding it was too risky to vote in Maine.
Of those brave students who decided to defy the secretary of state’s letter and vote in Maine in 2011 anyway, not one of them was prosecuted. That’s because not one of them had broken the law. All of them had voted legally in Maine. All of them were then and are now guaranteed the right to vote under the law and the U.S. Constitution.
A family member told me the other day that voting doesn’t matter. I disagree. If it didn’t matter, politicians wouldn’t work so hard to convince certain demographics not to do it. The sad fact is that some politicians don’t want students to vote. But, voting is power in a democracy. So vote if you are unhappy with politicians who say you can’t. Or vote in hope of positive change. Or vote just because you can. The ACLU will be there to defend any attack on your right to do so.
Shenna Bellows is executive director of the ACLU of Maine Foundation.
What a great piece. You live here for the majority of the year, you spend your money here, you work here — you get the vote here, so do it!
I agree. And I expect them to get a Maine driver’s license and register their car here as well.
Why? And, moreover, why would you assume that all college students have cars? I certainly didn’t when I was in college.
When you register to vote where you live you are declaring that place is your place of residence. As such you should comply with all legal requirements of residence in that state or town. If you want to claim another place as your legal residence, lets say the town where you grew up, and especially if you are doing so just to avoid having to pay Maine excise tax or income tax, then you should vote by absentee ballot.
You should vote where you are living, period. Driving a car has nothing to do with voting.
“When you register to vote where you live you are declaring that place is your place of residence.” You may believe that, but that is currently *not* the law. Perhaps you should work to have the law changed, but until that time….
http://maine.gov/sos/cec/elec/voterguide.html
Who can register and vote in Maine?
To register, you must be a United States citizen, at least 17 years of age, and have established a fixed principal home in Maine.
maine.gov/sos/bmv/licenses/getlicense.html
You must obtain a new Maine license within 30 days of becoming a resident of the State of Maine.
Just because you think laws do not apply to you or you choose to ignore them doesn’t make it so.
It seems the ACLU will go to the wall for them and then further insist that they MUST NOT in any way, shape or form need to produce a photo identification, as that would suppress these impressionable, young, crucial, caring, idealistic (blah, blah, blah) voters!
Contrary to what Shenna Bellows might think, people have no right to vote where they attend school. If they did, I would have voted in Orono when I was a student at the University of Maine.
actually they do, the Supreme court said so, so……
Condescension is most effective when you’re right. You aren’t. The Supreme Court never said that anyone has a right to vote where they attend school. That’s obviously ridiculous, as attending a school does not even mean that you live there. Case in point: a University of Maine student lives in Holden, attends the University of Maine; she has no right whatsoever to vote in the town of Orono.
Are you talking about town elections or state elections? You are absolutely correct if you are talking about town elections. They can vote in the town they live in and they can vote in the state elections. However if they live in Holden you are correct in saying they can not vote in the town of Orono town elections. Also the article was meaning state elections and voting in the national elections.
Any election. If you don’t live in Orono you can’t vote there. For anything. It doesn’t matter if you’re enrolled in classes. If you don’t live there, you can’t vote there. There is no “right” to vote where you attend school.
Yup you are not quite getting it. If they attend school at UMaine, but live in Holden, then yes they can vote in Maine and National elections in Holden. That is a right upheld by the Supreme Court. Their is a right to vote in the State that you attend school. I think you are confusing the place and state.
I’m not getting it? I said that you don’t have a right to vote where you go to school. The girl from Holden attends UMaine. She has no right to vote in Orono. I get it, and what’s more, I’m right.
yes you are right, but she can vote in Holden. That is what you are not getting
I know she can vote in Holden. I was a commuter, I know how the process works. You vote where you live, there isn’t some sacred right to vote where you attend school. Quit while you’re ahead.
I do jot think you got the article it was not implying that you have a right to.vote in oromo but you have a right to vote in Maine in general.
That’s not what I read. Say what you mean and mean what you say.
Do you have a real point though? Like I know you had fun going on and on about this issue for a couple of hours, so where are we now? You got to repeat some cliched phrase, good for you.
The point is that you do need to say what you mean. This is a serious issue that shouldn’t be defined by a clever catchphrase. It’s like “separation of church and state,” it’s cute, it’s easy to remember, but it makes people stupid. When you carry those ideas out to their logical conclusion, you come out in a very different place than if you had considered the issue itself.
There is no right to vote where you go to school. You have a right to vote where you live. Students need to give serious thought to where they live and vote where appropriate. If they consider themselves residents of Gorham, or Presque Isle, or Rochester, NY, that’s where they should be voting. Voting in Orono because you couldn’t get your act together and request an absentee ballot is unethical, and there are people at UMaine that encourage people to do it anyway. If you live in Orono that’s fine, but if you live in Orono then you live in Orono. That means that you should be paying taxes and registering any vehicles you own in that community. They should be following the same laws that the rest of us are.
Okay, well if you want to go out and nanny them, do that. But don’t go around pretending that you need a car and or a Maine ID to vote. You don’t need to paying taxes and or own property.
But if you do own a car it needs to be registered in Maine, you need a Maine driver’s license. The people registering voters on campus should take the time to make sure students understand the consequences of declaring residency in Maine, instead of just trying to score quick votes for Democrats.
http://www.maine.gov/sos/cec/elec/resident.htm
It’s a separate issue.
Not entirely. Out of state students are being told that they’re free to declare residency in Maine and vote. That’s true, but they don’t disclose that there are certain responsibilities that may come with residency. I’ll be the first to say that these are adults and they need to be responsible for themselves, but I’ve seen how it works at UMaine and it just isn’t right. Those who register and find themselves afoul of Maine’s motor vehicle laws probably wish that rather than screeching about their right to vote, the groups registering voters on campus had given them the whole story.
They do have a right to vote. All that other stuff? Fine, go nanny them. Feel free.
Why don’t you actually read the article and quit pretending that you’re ahead.
I did read the article and my comment was spot on. If it weren’t you’d simply refute it. Shenna Bellows wrote: “Students have the right to vote where they attend school.” Blatantly false.
You’re blatantly being obtuse. It’s very clear she’s talking about the state in general. “Where” is the state. You likely live in the state you attend school.
If you lived in Orono while you were a student, you could have voted there. Just because you didn’t doesn’t mean it’s illegal.
I did not live in Orono. Not all students live in the town where they attend school, which gives lie to the claim that the Supreme Court granted everyone a right to vote where they attend school.
I think where in this case means state.
We get it. Now you get it what’s being discussed.
We’re talking about students who live on campus or in Orono during the school year. So where did you live when you attended UMO?
“In Oregon v.Mitchell,” the Court ruled that all persons 18 years of age or older who
are otherwise qualified may vote in federal elections for President, Vice-
President, U.S. Senators and Congressmen. Furthermore, the Court
upheld section 1973 aa-1 of the 1970 Voting Rights Act which abolished
state durational residency requirements for voting in presidential elections”.
That doesn’t necessarily mean that students may not vote in local elections. See: http://scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1770&context=vulr
Not sure that Ms. Bellows is correct on all points.
Seems that students could get absentee ballots from the town/city in which they reside, and legally vote.
In the 1998 primary, students from UMO had a bus ride to Bangor to vote. Wonder if they voted in the Orona area and by absentee from where they lived!
Honestly, your comment is pretty ridiculous. Since it’s possible they could break the law, they must have broken the law? You could just as easily vote in two places as well — should we be suspicious of you?
You correctly proved his point, wolf, about how easy it would be for fraud to occur. Thank you.
No, I proved that it is a stupid non-point. The absence of evidence isn’t evidence.
But whatever, if you want to use that kind of logic, then let’s do it. But let’s be consistent and apply it universally. If voting needs tighter controls because it is easy for fraud to occur, then maybe we need much tighter controls for guns. After all, crimes involving guns happen on a daily basis in high numbers. It’s much too easy to commit a crime with a gun.
You want to keep going? I bet you don’t.
At least for other than primaries, there is a polling place on campus. And, guess what. There is regular bus service between campus and downtown Orono.
Odd. People who live in the dorms would be Orono residents, and those in University Park are Old Town residents. I wonder why they should be driven the Bangor for anything.
Students who live in Bangor and Hermon should remember the fervent opposition of incumbent State Senator Nichi Farnum to same day voter registration and voting and equally passionate endorsement of voter ID. If she’s re-elected these anti-democratic sentiments and policies will try to rise again. Vote for her progressive-minded opponent, City Councilman and medical doctor Geoffrey Chadwick.
Strange how that ONLY works for voting…If you walk into a gun shop and toss your Mass. ID on the counter and ask to buy a gun you will be told as a resident of Mass. you can’t purchase guns or ammo without a FIOD card from Mass. Which is next to impossible to get by the way.. It doesn’t matter if you go to school here , own land here , spend every summer here or vote here….The law should be changed to make it more clear as to who is and who isn’t allowed to vote here…We have alot of part time folks here…Having to show an ID isn’t the big hardship democrats claim it is…We do it for just about everything else…The fact is it will cost the democrats votes and that’s why they cry and whine about it…If your not a resident of the town AND state you have no business voting here IMHO…
Then take it to the Supreme Court, otherwise, pipe down.