Supreme Court Decision

[fabrisse]

When I was in college, either five years ago -- according to John of Canterbury's reckoning -- or when the dinosaurs roamed, I refused to sign petitions. My parents paid for me to go to school, with no student loans or request to pay them back, and it seemed disrespectful to me to sign my name to a document which I knew they would disapprove of. The military looked at the family more closely back then, too.

I have always been aware that signing a petition meant I was making a public statement of my beliefs. So I was not shocked that the Supremes went 8 - 1 on the Doe versus Reed case about disclosure of petition signatories for ballot initiatives; they upheld the existing law that all of these were public. It's still possible to seek an exemption if it can be proved those signing face something more than simple harrassment.

Imagine my surprise at the number of people posting comments at the LATimes and Slate that this is equivalent to eliminating the secret ballot. Apparently, we are now on the road to becoming North Korea by the Supreme Court's decision to let this stand.

My point, which I made in the comments at both sites, is that the ballot is secret, but voter registration is not. I have to prove I am Fabrisse to get a ballot. If I live in a state without mail-in options, I must go to the polling place in order to vote. These are public acts, public declarations that I uphold my duties as a citizen in order to have my rights as a citizen.

Am I viewing this the wrong way? I don't want to have to learn Korean.

Comments

[tpau]

hm... i think i am with you on this one. a petition is a public declaration of support.

[daylyn.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I agree with you. I haven't read the decision, but it seems to me that if you sign a petition you public declare your support for whatever the petition stands for. Which is why I've always been aware of what I was signing (good advice in any circumstances, btw).

Thomas as the dissenter? Really? (and he actually voted differently from Scalia? Really?) Another SCOTUS oddity.

[innerslytherin]

I agree with you.

[siderea]

Well, I've always disagreed with your stance about being "respectful" to your parents by not exercising your political conscience, but I agree that the whole point of petitions (as the term is usually meant) is a public endorsement of the petition statement.

That said, I don't see it necessarily as a matter of justice -- we could have secret petitions or open petitions, either way, just so long as everyone knows what the rules are, and society can work OK. I think. I'm open to arguments either way.

[riverfox.livejournal.com]

Equivalent to eliminating the secret ballot, like a vote? That's stupid. What are they, flunk-outs from political science? Petitions are public documents that are nothing short of an "opinion poll" sent to a member of Congress or some other organization. Unless someone's testifying in a legal setting and under a gag order, petitions can't be used as a privacy issue.