New law clears up voting confusion for Alabamians with a felony

MONTGOMERY, AL (WSFA) - Governor Kay Ivey signed a bill into law Wednesday that clears up confusion for some 250,000 Alabamians who currently can't vote due to a felony conviction.

There's now a list that clearly defines which felonies prohibit someone from the ballot box for life. For others, this bill could restore their voting rights, but just how many remains unclear.

If you've been convicted of a crime, the Southern Poverty Law Center breaks it down like this: your voting rights fall into one of three categories.

The first, you're permanently disenfranchised. This includes people with murder or rape convictions. The third category is for those with misdemeanors who never lost the right to vote, but the middle category, the one the law deals with, is for those who have been convicted of a felony, but there's a grey area surrounding their voting rights.

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danarhea said:

Alabama had a law on the books which prohibited people convicted of crimes of moral turpitude from voting. Possession of weed was moral turpitide, and that kept a lot of blacks from voting. However, fraud and other white collar crimes were not considered moral turpitude, and kept a lot of whites eligible to vote. The moral turpitude law, passed in 1901, was specifically designed to Jim Crow the vote. Happily, that has just ended, with the Governor signing a bill into law which will now allow a quarter of a million felons to vote once they have paid their debt to society. As of now, only murder, rape, and other serious crimes will have the moral turpitude label attached to them.

It is refreshing to see a Republican controlled state invigorate the black vote, rather than attempting to tamp it down, as other states have been trying to do. Kudos to Alabama.

New law clears up voting confusion for Alabamians with a felony - WSFA.com Montgomery Alabama news.

Click to expand...

danarhea said:

Alabama had a law on the books which prohibited people convicted of crimes of moral turpitude from voting. Possession of weed was moral turpitide, and that kept a lot of blacks from voting. However, fraud and other white collar crimes were not considered moral turpitude, and kept a lot of whites eligible to vote. The moral turpitude law, passed in 1901, was specifically designed to Jim Crow the vote. Happily, that has just ended, with the Governor signing a bill into law which will now allow a quarter of a million felons to vote once they have paid their debt to society. As of now, only murder, rape, and other serious crimes will have the moral turpitude label attached to them.

It is refreshing to see a Republican controlled state invigorate the black vote, rather than attempting to tamp it down, as other states have been trying to do. Kudos to Alabama.

New law clears up voting confusion for Alabamians with a felony - WSFA.com Montgomery Alabama news.

Click to expand...

danarhea said:

Alabama had a law on the books which prohibited people convicted of crimes of moral turpitude from voting. Possession of weed was moral turpitide, and that kept a lot of blacks from voting. However, fraud and other white collar crimes were not considered moral turpitude, and kept a lot of whites eligible to vote. The moral turpitude law, passed in 1901, was specifically designed to Jim Crow the vote. Happily, that has just ended, with the Governor signing a bill into law which will now allow a quarter of a million felons to vote once they have paid their debt to society. As of now, only murder, rape, and other serious crimes will have the moral turpitude label attached to them.

It is refreshing to see a Republican controlled state invigorate the black vote, rather than attempting to tamp it down, as other states have been trying to do. Kudos to Alabama.

New law clears up voting confusion for Alabamians with a felony - WSFA.com Montgomery Alabama news.

Click to expand...