Crawford V. Marion County Election Board - Dissents

Dissents

Justice David Souter, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, filed a dissenting opinion, which would have declared the voter ID laws unconstitutional. Souter argued that Indiana had the burden of producing actual evidence of the existence of fraud, as opposed to relying on abstract harms, before imposing "an unreasonable and irrelevant burden on voters who are poor and old."

Justice Stephen Breyer also filed a dissenting opinion arguing that Indiana's law was unconstitutional. While he spoke approvingly of some voter ID laws, he found that Indiana's procedures for acquiring an ID were too burdensome and costly for some low income or elderly voters.

The legislation's partisan motivations and implications fueled much of the controversy. While the majority conceded that Republican Party's partisan interest in reducing low-income voter turnout likely played a role in motivating the law's passage, it found that the law's valid neutral justifications "should not be disregarded simply because partisan interests may have provided one motivation for the votes of individual legislators."