On February 25, the 5th circuit construed Section 241 of the Mississippi Constitution. That section is written with confusing sentence construction. Plaintiffs had argued that it seems to say that felons can vote in presidential elections, but the Court read it another way. Here is the decision, Young v Hosemann, 08-60941.
Section 241 says, “Qualification for Electors. Every inhabitant of this state, except idiots and insane persons, who is a citizen of the United States of America, 18 years old and upward, who has been a resident of this state for one year, and for one year in the county in which he offers to vote, and for 6 months in the election precinct or in the incorporated city or town in which he offers to vote, and who is duly registered as provided in this article, and who has never been convicted of murder, rape, bribery, theft, arson, obtaining money or goods under false pretense, perjury, forgery, embezzlement or bigamy, is declared to be a qualified elector, except that he shall be qualified to vote for President and Vice President of the United States if he meets the requirements established by Congress therefor and is otherwise a qualified elector.”
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So the people who drafted and passed this… they wouldn’t be qualified to vote, because they wouldn’t get past the “except idiots and insane persons” clause, right?
Does Mississippi law actually clearly define “idiots and insane persons” somewhere?
According to The Associated Press, “A similar lawsuit is pending in Hinds County [Jackson] Chancery Court. It challenges [Mississippi’s] denial of voting rights to people convicted of felonies that include shoplifting, timber larceny and extortion, which were among those added in 2004.”
The AP: “The constitution initially listed 10 crimes [see above] that would strip voting rights. Eleven other crimes were added in 2004 based on a state attorney general’s opinion.”
“Other felonies not on the list, such as dealing drugs, don’t affect voting rights.”
Another challenge could be premised on Article II’s Election Clause, which delegates to the state “Legislature” the power to regulate presidential elections. Because this felon-disenfranchisement provision is codified in the state constitution, as opposed to a legislatively-passed statute, it cannot be applied to a presidential election. This is the teaching of Bush v. Palm Beach County Boar of Electors (2000) and Libertarian Party of Ohio v. Brunner (S.D. Ohio 2008).