Supreme Court Sends Voter ID Law Back to Lower Court for Further Review

The state Supreme Court is pushing Pennsylvania's new Voter ID law back to Commonwealth Court for further review, multiple news organizations are reporting.

A week after hearing oral arguments, the justices voted 4-2 to have the lower court once again review the measures included in the law.

Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson on Aug. 15 released his decision that parties challenging the Voter ID law were not able to prove it will cause “immediate and irreparable harm” to the electorate.

However, the justices want the court to reconsider whether there are enough alternative forms of identification allowed by the law so as not to disenfranchise voters, according to PennLive.com.

The order from the Supreme Court justices insinuates that the state has not had enough time to effectively implement the law. It also states that initial intentions by the state for Voter ID to be easily obtained has not come to fruition because of strict standards for government-sanctioned identification.

They also said that the Commonwealth Court should decide whether an alternative Photo ID used only for voting would satisfy the requirements of the law and be implemented in time.

"Overall, we are confronted with an ambitious effort on the part of the General Assembly to bring the new identification procedure into effect within a relatively short time frame and an implementation process which has by no means been seamless in light of the serious operational constraints faced by the executive branch," the majority justices wrote in their opinion.

The justices released a 7-page announcement Tuesday afternoon. The document can be found by clicking this link.