As I thought, Judge Robert Simpson splits the difference. (Have I mentioned Pennsylvania has elected judges?) The good news is, the Voter ID law will not be fully implemented until after the presidential election, and makes it much easier to vote via provisional ballot (you won't have to appear before the county election board), but are just as likely to have that vote tossed on technical grounds (like not sealing the envelope correctly). But voters will now have their vote count, which was not as likely before this ruling:

Last month, the Pennsylvania Supreme Courtunanimously rejected a lower court judge’s decision allowing that state’s voter ID law to move forward. The high court ordered the trial judge to reexamine the case to entire “liberal access” the ID voters need to vote, and to ensure that voter disenfranchisement will not result from the voter ID law — which the state’s Republican House Majority Leader said was enacted to “allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania.”

This morning, the lower court judge responded to the state supreme court’s order, and he blocked some — but not all — of the state’s voter suppression law. The punchline of his opinion is that voters will still be asked to present IDs at the polls, but voters without IDs will be allowed to cast a provisional ballot, and the provision of the voter ID law that effectively prevents these provisional ballots from being counted will not take effect:

I reject the underlying assertion that the offending activity is the request to produce photo ID; instead, I conclude that the salient offending conduct is voter disenfranchisement. As a result, I will not restrain election officials from asking for photo ID at the polls; rather, I will enjoin enforcement of those parts of Act 18 which directly result in disenfranchisement. . .

As to voter disenfranchisement, I carefully reviewed the language of the Election Code after amendment by Act 18. The language of disenfranchisement is found in the part of the Election Code dealing with provisional ballots: “A provisional ballot shall not be counted if ….” This language pre-existed Act 18, but Act 18 added two new circumstances when a provisional vote will not be counted. Both of these new circumstances relate to electors who are unable to produce proof of identification. . . . Thus, disenfranchisement expressly occurs during the provisional ballot part of the in-person voting process, which is addressed in subsections (a.2) and (a.4) of Section 1210. It is this part of the process which must be enjoined to prevent disenfranchisement.

The two provisions that the judge enjoined requires a voter who casts a provision ballot to “appear before the county board of elections” within six days after the election to prove their identity — normally by showing an ID. These provisions are no longer in effect, meaning that individuals who vote without IDs can have their provisional ballots cast without having to jump through even more hoops after the election.

This year's Election Day isn't only about Obama -- it's about all the down ticket races, too, and sending a brushback pitch to Republican extremists (who, God help us, make the Democratic party look almost liberal by comparison). Daily Kos is helping to organize a massive get out the vote operation in Pennsylvania with the Urban League's Occupy the Vote (as you can see from the above video, Republicans are doing their best to fix the election here by suppressing Democratic votes).

Pennsylvania needs your help to counteract the new Voter ID law, which is intended to keep Democrats away from the polls on Election Day. This is part of an organized effort across state legislatures, and it's infuriating.

You have a few options. You can 1) sit on your hands and complain about what the Republicans are doing, or you can 2) volunteer even a few hours of your time FROM THE COMFORT OF YOUR OWN HOME to make phone calls. If you are physically able and willing, you can also do canvassing, work voter registration tables, do data entry or give rides to the polls.

Click here if you can help even a little.

I've never heard of a decision like this.They vacated the lower court decision without vacating the law. It seems designed to throw the political hot potato back to the lower court and doesn't seem to be good news, but some experts are saying it is and almost forces the judge to enjoin the law before the election.:

In a potentially significant victory for Democrats, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court vacated a lower court's decision to uphold the states's restrictive new voter ID law on Tuesday, and asked the judge to consider enjoining it instead.

The law, passed by a Republican legislature and governor, requires voters to have specific, state-issued photo ID -- a move that opponents say could disenfranchise tens of thousands of people, most of them minorities, students and the elderly.

"We are not satisfied with a mere predictive judgment based primarily on the assurances of government officials," the court wrote of arguments that voters would not be disenfranchised by the law.

The court ruled 4-2, with two dissenting justices saying it should have blocked the law outright. One justice accused the court of "punting" and said she would have "no part in it."

The state Supreme Court sent the case back to the Commonwealth Court judge, but with instructions that seemed almost designed to force him to enjoin the law. Given the fact that there are less than two months until the election, the justices wrote, "the most judicious remedy, in such a circumstance, is the entry of a preliminary injunction, which may moot further controversy as the constitutional impediments dissipate."

The judge was instructed "to consider whether the procedures being used for deployment" of ID cards comports with the law as written -- which the court itself made clear was not the case. "The Department of State has realized, and the Commonwealth parties have candidly conceded, that the Law is not being implemented according to its terms," the justices wrote.

The justices, for instance, noted in their decision that while the law called for voters to be granted state-issued ID simply upon an affirmation, "as implementation of the Law has proceeded, PennDOT -- apparently for good reason -- has refused to allow such liberal access."

If those procedures are not being followed, or if the judge was "not still convinced ... that there will be no voter disenfranchisement arising out of the Commonwealth’s implementation of a voter identification requirement for purposes of the upcoming election" then he would be "obliged to enter a preliminary injunction," the higher court wrote.

The court agreed that the short timeframe of the law's implementation just months before Election Day presented a potential constitutional issue, but noted that even the appelants agreed that such a law could be implemented.

The two Democratic justices who were most outspoken during last week's oral arguments both dissented from the majority opinion, saying the high court should have issued an injunction itself.

Justice Seamus P. McCaffery wrote in his dissent:

I was elected by the people of our Commonwealth, by Republicans, Democrats, Independents and others, as was every single Justice on this esteemed Court. I cannot now be a party to the potential disenfranchisement of even one otherwise qualified elector, including potentially many elderly and possibly disabled veterans who fought for the rights of every American to exercise their fundamental American right to vote.

While I have no argument with the requirement that all Pennsylvania voters, at some reasonable point in the future, will have to present photo identification before they may cast their ballots, it is clear to me that the reason for the urgency of implementing Act 18 prior to the November 2012 election is purely political. That has been made abundantly clear by the House Majority Leader. I cannot in good conscience participate in a decision that so clearly has the effect of allowing politics to trump the solemn oath that I swore to uphold our Constitution. That Constitution has made the right to vote a right verging on the sacred, and that right should never be trampled by partisan politics.

McCaffery was referring to a declaration in June by Pennsylvania's GOP House majority leader, Mike Turzai, that the voter ID law "is going to allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania."

Justice Debra McCloskey Todd wrote in her dissent, "By remanding to the Commonwealth Court, at this late date, and at this most critical civic moment, in my view, this Court abdicates its duty to emphatically decide a legal controversy vitally important to the citizens of this Commonwealth. The eyes of the nation are upon us, and this Court has chosen to punt rather than to act. I will have no part of it."

The decision gave Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson until Oct. 2 to file his new opinion.

The ruling is expected to come down at the end of September, and either way, will affect this year's presidential election. Although the PA Supreme Court is notoriously corrupt, there's also a reasonable chance that Chief Justice Ron Castille, a Republican, will side with the Democrats:

The legal team fighting Pennsylvania's restrictive new voter identification law asked the state's Supreme Court on Thursday to at least postpone until after November the measure that could disenfranchise tens of thousands of voters, many of them minorities.

"There's too little time, there's too many people affected and there's no place in the statute that guarantees that qualified electors can get the ID they need to vote," said David P. Gersch, representing the American Civil Liberties Union and other public interest groups.

The three Democratic justices noted the nonexistence of the voter fraud the law is ostensibly designed to prevent, and repeatedly asked lawyers representing the state's Republican-led legislature and Republican governor, "What's the rush?"

But even if the nation's top courts were once a place where partisan differences were overcome, these days they are more likely to be one more place for partisan battles. On Thursday, the three Republican Supreme Court justices gave little indication that they would overrule a district court decision last month that let the law stand. In case of a tie, the lower court ruling would remain in effect.

{...] Pennsylvania's GOP House majority leader, Mike Turzai, provided a clear view of the motivation behind the voter ID laws when he recently declared that the voter ID law "is going to allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania."

Democratic Justice Seamus McCaffery alluded to Turzai's statement at Thursday's hearing. "There's no public harm that we can see [from voter fraud]," he said. "Could it be politics, maybe?"

There are some hints that at least one Republican justice could break ranks. At the hearing, Justice Thomas Saylor, a Republican, asked the state's lawyers whether the law guarantees every registered voter can cast a vote -- a question they could only answer in the negative. The Philadelphia Inquirer editorial board raised the possibility that Pennsylvania Chief Justice Ron Castille might ultimately side with the Democrats on this issue.