Don't forget the Indiana Voter ID Decision Back in 2008

This decision by the U.S. Supreme Kangaroo Conservative Court way back in April 2008 couldn't sound partisan :

The Supreme Court  upheld Indiana’s voter-identification law on Monday, declaring that a requirement to produce photo identification is not unconstitutional and that the state has a “valid interest” in improving election procedures as well as deterring fraud. In a 6-to-3 ruling, the court rejected arguments that Indiana’s law imposes unjustified burdens on people who are old, poor or members of minority groups and less likely to have driver’s licenses or other acceptable forms of identification. Because Indiana’s law is considered the strictest in the country, similar laws in the other 20 or so states that have photo-identification rules would appear to have a good chance of surviving scrutiny.

What this means now four years later is anybodies guess. Wisconsin’s recent decision was based on the state constitution. But when you have to deal with these conservative activist Justices...

NY Times: Justice John Paul Stevens wrote the justifications for the law “should not be disregarded simply because partisan interests may have provided one motivation for the votes of individual legislators.” Democrats and civil rights groups who attacked the law, seeking a declaration that it was unconstitutional on its face, had failed to meet the heavy burden required for such a “facial challenge” to prevail.

Perhaps, they suggested, the outcome could be different in another voter-rights case, one in which a plaintiff could show that his or her rights had been violated … a lawsuit brought by someone (who) was actually barred by the statute from casting a ballot.

Despite all the estimates of disenfranchisement and trouble citizens have reported trying to obtain a picture voter ID, that still wasn’t enough for the partisan paranoid minds on the Supreme Court fixated on this century and a half long conservative goal.

In an opinion by Justice Scalia, the three justices said, “The law should be upheld because its overall burden is minimal and justified.” Brian C. Bosma, who was speaker of the Indiana House when the law was enacted and is now the House’s Republican leader, dismissed the Democrats’ complaints. “This is only a burden for those who want to vote more than once,” Mr. Bosma said in a telephone interview from Indianapolis. “It protects everyone.”

There was also discussion over how much voter fraud really exists, with some suggestions that the reason it has apparently never been prosecuted in Indiana is because those who commit fraud are good at it.

Has the conservative goal to own the courts and win the political legislative challenges moved our country past the point of no return? We'll know soon enough.