Case Sheets: Voters' Rights - Rhode Island Affiliate, ACLU (American Civil LIberties Union)

THE RHODE ISLAND ACLU AND THE RIGHTS OF VOTERS

The right to vote remains among the most fundamental of rights in a democratic society, and the R.I. ACLU has been extremely vigilant in challenging government efforts to limit or impede the exercise of that right. Below are some of the voting rights cases in which the Affiliate has been involved over the years:

1973: Capalbo v. Chariho Regional School Committee -- Successful lawsuit challenging a school district practice of barring persons who did not meet certain property tax qualifications from voting in the annual School District Town Meeting.

1979: R.I. Minority Caucus v. Baronian -- Successful court challenge to a Board of Canvassers practice of deputizing as voter registrars only persons who had been recommended by three private organizations.

1980: Lancellotta v. West Warwick -- The first of a half-dozen successful Affiliate court challenges to town ordinances banning the posting of election signs in residential areas.

1984: Project Vote R.I. v. Hackett -- Favorably settled federal lawsuit on behalf of a voter registration group which had been barred from registering voters in the lobbies of state unemployment offices.

1984: Puerto Rican Political Action Committee v. DiStefano -- Successful federal lawsuit challenging, as an illegal literacy test, a complex state “verification procedure” for newly registered voters.

1992: Pitochelli v. Town of Johnston -- Successful federal lawsuit requiring the Town of Johnston to reapportion its city council and school committee districts after failing to do so for more than twenty years.

1993: Vote Choice v. DiStefano -- Federal lawsuit successfully challenging a state law requiring that the names of people making small donations to controversial PAC’s be made public.

1994: Ayers-Schaffner v. DiStefano -- Successful federal lawsuit on behalf of residents who had been barred from voting in a rescheduled primary election if they had not voted in the original, illegally conducted primary.

1996: League of Women Voters of R.I. v. R.I. State Board of Elections -- Successful federal lawsuit requiring the state to take immediate action to fully comply with the National Voter Registration Act.

2001: Bonas v. Town of North Smithfield -- Successful federal lawsuit challenging a town’s decision not to hold regularly-scheduled local elections in 2001, relying on the results of a 1998 referendum which authorized a change in town elections from odd to even numbered years “beginning in the year 2002.”

2002: Abdullah-Odiase v. Begin -- Successful appeal on behalf of a candidate for office whose name was stricken from the ballot because one of her nomination papers allegedly contained signatures not witnessed by her.

2003: Metts v. Almond -- Successful “friend of the court” brief in this redistricting lawsuit, arguing that the lower court improperly dismissed claims that black voting power in Providence was improperly diluted.