Shirley Preiss was born in Kentucky in 1910 - a full 10 years before American women gained the right to vote. She first voted in a presidential election in 1932, for FDR. She's voted in every presidential election since, but that's all about to change due to Arizona's draconian voter ID law.
As Art Levine reported, Shirley effectively lost her right to vote when she moved to Arizona:
After living in Arizona for two years, she was eagerly looking forward to casting her ballot in the February primary for the first major woman candidate for President, Hillary Clinton. But lacking a birth certificate or even elementary school records to prove she's a native-born American citizen, the state of Arizona's bureaucrats determined that this former school-teacher who taught generations of Americans shouldn't be allowed to vote.
The state's voter ID law, passed in 2004, requires voters to show ID at the polling place and to provide proof of citizenship in order to register. But birth certificates weren't issued in 1910 in Shirley's birthplace of Clinton, KY, and her elementary school no longer exists.
Shirley appeared on the local news Monday night in Phoenix to tell her story:
She's far from the only victim of this law. The Arizona Advocacy Network reports that nearly 40,000 voter registration forms have been rejected due to inadequate proof of citizenship. And it's getting to be a national problem.
The Supreme Court gave Indiana the green light last month on its restrictive voter ID law, and other states have already or are in the process of passing similar laws. Everywhere such laws are enacted, the voting rights of thousands of Americans - especially among the poor, elderly, and minorities - are put at risk. Fortunately many other states have fended off voter ID laws, and I'm proud that People For the American Way's Democracy Campaign played a role in many of those fights. Nothing short of a concerted effort by the progressive movement over the coming years will succeed in safeguarding the right to vote.
Kolbert is president of People For the American Way
