Critics: Proposed Ga. Law Amounts to a Poll Tax

A proposed Georgia law would require prospective voters to prove citizenship, a practice opponents say would keep the poor, elderly and minorities away from the polls as taxes and literacy tests once did.

It's been more than 40 years since the Voting Rights Act was signed, barring voting practices used throughout the South for years to keep poor blacks from voting. Today in Georgia, registering to vote is simple: check a box on an application affirming you are a citizen.

However, both chambers of the Georgia Legislature approved a bill earlier this month that would require people to provide a birth certificate, U.S. passport, naturalization papers or other documents proving citizenship. Similar bills have surfaced this year in five other states — Colorado, Illinois, Tennessee, Washington and Virginia, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Supporters, including the official in charge of Georgia elections, have said the measure would protect the integrity of the voting process. Critics have countered people who don't have the documents available or can't afford the costs of getting copies might end up being disenfranchised.

"It's a poll tax and we've lived through that before," said Jerry Gonzalez, executive director of the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials. "America has changed. We elected an African-American president, but Georgia wants to go back to the 1950s by enacting very restrictive, very cumbersome voting practices."

They point to Arizona — the only state with such a law — saying citizens there have had trouble because of what they call burdensome requirements.

"The results so far show that people who are citizens but were unable to produce the right documentation lost the right to vote. I mean that's what the result is," said Larry Frankel, a Washington-based attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union. "It isn't as if people who are in an illegal status are rushing to the polls to vote because that's a good way of getting caught."