I don’t know what exactly the Republican Lawyer’s Association is, and I know even less about their Republican Lawyer Blog.  What I do know is that the following allusion to voter fraud is making its rounds throughout the far-right blogosphere.

Vote fraud has reared its ugly head yet again, this time in a small town in South Carolina. The Atlantic Beach Election Commission has overturned the results of a November 1 election because of sweeping allegations of vote fraud.

This apparently is another case of the voter fraud pandemic overwhelming our land.  NOT!

Note this report from scnow.com which was posted just a few days before the Atlantic Beach Incident.

The state election commission said there are no known cases of voter fraud in recent history. Senator John Scott (District 19) said if the new law does go into effect certain members of minority groups, the elderly and residents in rural areas, who do not have a photo id, would unfairly lose their right to vote. Rep. Alan Clemmons said without the photo id requirement there are flaws in the state’s voting system.

Yet the “sweeping allegation of vote fraud”, was described by the cited article as follows:

Windy Price, Misty Umphries and James Van Fleet appealed after the votes were certified on Thursday.
Webb said the three claimed there was intimidation to both voters and candidates and that there was possible voter registration and vote fraud. The trio also questioned some of the voting machines.

The commission apparently agreed.

But what did the commission agree to?  Basically that there was evidence of voter intimidation.  Furthermore, the reference was to vote fraud, not voter fraud.  That is, the commission saw irregularities with the way the voting was handled, including allowing certain candidates to meet and greet in the voting area.

Now a few more details:

Despite challenged votes, Evans was declared the town’s new mayor after receiving 55 votes to incumbent Retha Pierce’s 18 and Price’s 21, based on Thursday’s certified election results.

Isom and Taylor got the most votes for the two council seats – 53 and 55 respectively. The two beat out three other candidates: Monique Pointer, who received 16 votes, Umphries, who received 21 votes, and Fleet, with 16 votes.

http://www.thesunnews.com/2011/11/04/2481880/hearings-on-atlantic-beach-myrtle.html#storylink=mirelated#ixzz1gAUwHW7N

Whatever the irregularities, it does not equal to a large-scale case of voter impersonation.

One wonders.  Is this an adequate reason to deny hundreds of thousands of legitimate voters the right to vote in the next general election due to radical changes to the voting laws? ProjectVote.com provides the following:

Voting rights advocates pointed out that around 700,000 of South Carolina’s registered voters do not have a state-issued photo ID. Most of these voters are poor or elderly, and many are African American. Voting rights advocates and Democratic lawmakers in South Carolina have charged that the law will create a burden that will discourage voter turnout. And like Texas, voting rights advocates point out, there were no official reports of voter fraud during the 2008 general election.