U.S. Supreme Court
May 13, 2016
Officials mustn't put a price on 'access'
Virginia's former governor, Robert McDonnell, is asking the Supreme Court to authorize a new kind of poll tax on another right integral to our democracy: citizens' constitutional right to petition their government. By Stuart McPhail
Fifty years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Virginia's poll tax. Justice William O. Douglas, writing for the court, held that "[t]he principle that denies the State the right to dilute a citizen's vote on account of his economic status or other such factors, by analogy, bars a system which excludes those unable to pay a fee to vote or who fail to pay it." Fifty years later, Virginia's former governor, Robert McDonnell, is...
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