OPINION:
“Plaintiffs challenge law that strips felons of their right to vote” (page A12, June 28) reports on a lawsuit claiming that Virginia cannot disenfranchise felons because of the terms of the Virginia Readmission Act of 1870.
That law says Virginia can’t amend its constitution to disenfranchise those assured of the right to vote by the U.S. Constitution. There are a number of problems with this claim.
In Lincoln’s view, which I believe is the right one, secession did not in fact take the Confederate states out of the Union, so it is probably unconstitutional to put permanent limits on Virginia’s sovereignty as the price for recovering sovereign rights it never lost.
Since the ban on felon voting applies to everybody, it doesn’t violate any anti-discrimination provisions of the U.S. Constitution.
The ban applies only to changes in the Virginia Constitution, not to changes in its statutory law, so if the ban on felon voting is statutory, the act doesn’t apply.
The lawsuit should be thrown out on summary judgment.
JIM DUEHOLM
Washington
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