Illinois law dean Vikram David Amar explains why Georgia’s law allowing persons 75 years and older to get absentee ballots for all elections in an election cycle with a single request, while requiring younger voters to request absentee ballots separately for each election, is a clear violation of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment. Dean Amar acknowledges that timing may prevent this age discrimination from being redressed in 2020, but he calls upon legislatures and courts to understand the meaning of this amendment and prevent such invidious disparate treatment of voters in future years.
NYU law professor Samuel Estreicher comments on a recent decision by the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit that purports to interpret the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) based on a textualist approach. Estreicher argues that the interpretation erroneously ignores the clear purpose of ADEA and constitutes a highly abstract interpretive venture that departs significantly from the legislators’ manifest intent.
