BREAKING: Judge: Ohio 'Poll Challengers' Unconstitutional http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/110204Z.shtml Judge Bars Challengers From Polling Places The Associated Press Monday 01 November 2004 Dlott hands Republicans another legal setback. A federal judge in Cincinnati early today barred political party challengers at polling places throughout Ohio. In another legal setback for Republicans, U.S. District Judge Susan Dlott ruled that the presence of challengers inexperienced in the electoral process would impede voting on Tuesday. She ruled that application of Ohio's statute allowing challengers at polling places is unconstitutional. Dlott ruled on a lawsuit by a Cincinnati couple, Marian Spencer, a former Cincinnati city council member, and her husband Donald. The Spencers said Republican plans to deploy challengers to largely black precincts in Hamilton County was meant to intimidate and block black voters. Republicans said they wanted to prevent voter fraud. Dlott said in her preliminary injunction order that the evidence "does not indicate that the presence of additional challengers would serve Ohio's interest in preventing voter fraud better than would the system of election judges ..." It was the second election-related ruling by Dlott that went against the Republicans. On Friday, Dlott stopped all hearings on about 30,000 new voter registration challenges in Ohio. While Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell was named as a defendant in the suit, he spoke out Friday against allowing the private challengers in the polling places. On Friday, Blackwell instructed Attorney General Jim Petro to recommend that challengers from both political parties be excluded from polling places because there was not enough time to resolve the legal issues. Petro refused, saying Blackwell's request was illegal. © : t r u t h o u t 2004 -- ============================================================ If you find this material useful, you might want to check out our website (http://cyberjournal.org) or try out our low-traffic, moderated email list by sending a message to: •••@••.••• You are encouraged to forward any material from the lists or the website, provided it is for non-commercial use and you include the source and this disclaimer. Richard Moore (rkm) Wexford, Ireland "Global Transformation: Whey We Need It And How We Can Achieve It", current draft: http://www.ratical.org/co-globalize/rkmGlblTrans.html _____________________________ "...the Patriot Act followed 9-11 as smoothly as the suspension of the Weimar constitution followed the Reichstag fire." - Srdja Trifkovic There is not a problem with the system. The system is the problem. Faith in ourselves - not gods, ideologies, leaders, or programs. _____________________________ "Zen of Global Transformation" home page: http://www.QuayLargo.com/Transformation/ QuayLargo discussion forum: http://www.QuayLargo.com/Transformation/ShowChat/?ScreenName=ShowThreads cj list archives: http://cyberjournal.org/cj/show_archives/?lists=cj newslog list archives: http://cyberjournal.org/cj/show_archives/?lists=newslog _____________________________ Informative links: http://www.indymedia.org/ http://www.globalresearch.ca/ http://www.MiddleEast.org http://www.rachel.org http://www.truthout.org http://www.williambowles.info/monthly_index/ http://www.zmag.org http://www.co-intelligence.org ============================================================
