Congratulations to Sozi Tulante and his great team in Philadelphia for a win today in the 3rd Circuit on an important case involving voter registration issues. The City of Philadelphia does not remove convicted felons from its voter rolls. The ACRU (American Civil Rights Union) sued claiming the City's practice violated the NVRA (National Voter Registration Act) and HAVA (Help America Vote Act). The lower court dismissed the complaint finding among other reasons that ACRU misstated the plain language of the statute. The 3rd Circuit affirmed. The court noted that disenfranchisement is under the NVRA incorporates state law provisions. Thus, where in some states a felony conviction alters a person's right to vote, in others it does not. The court looked at Pennsylvania law and concluded that the City's practices did not violate the law. The Court also noted that the purpose of the NVRA was voter enfranchisement not disenfranchisement and that while the NVRA had a citizen suit component the HAVA did not. The court said: "In short, once a person is properly registered to vote, a state is only permitted to remove him or her from the voting list for narrowly specified reasons." http://www2.ca3.uscourts.gov/opinarch/163811p.pdf Charles W. Thompson, Jr. Executive Director and General Counsel International Municipal Lawyers Association, Inc. 51 Monroe Street Suite 404 Rockville, Maryland 20850 202-466-5424 x7110 Direct: 202-742-1016 Cell: 240-876-6790 Plan ahead: IMLA's Annual Conference October 14- October 18, 2017 - Niagara, Ontario, Canada (Passport required) To register, go to: http://imla.org/events/conferences#registration IMLA's Annual Seminar and Section 1983 Defense Conference - April 20- April 23, 2018 Washington, DC