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The Messy History of Michigan's Purity Clause

Texas Republicans were rightly pilloried in the summer of 2021 for declaring an intent to protect “the purity of the ballot box” in draft legislation that would disproportionately disenfranchise voters of color.1 The phrase, rooted in Texas’s 1876 constitution,2 evoked ugly memories of the Jim Crow South—a past which, as the substance of the bill reminded, is not even past. But a state constitutional grant of legislative authority to protect election “purity” isn’t unique to Texas or the South.3 It’s a feature of Michigan’s constitution, too, first appearing in the constitution of 1850, which (in addition to limiting the vote to white men and some “civilized . . . Indian[s]”) provided that “[l]aws may be passed to preserve the purity of elections and guard against abuses of the elective franchise.”4 That “Purity Clause,” reenacted in Michigan’s two subsequent constitutions,5 still resonates today. Recently—for instance, in a 2007 decision upholding Michigan’s first voter ID law6 and in a 2020 decision barring election officials from counting timely-mailed absentee ballots received after polls close on Election Day7—Michigan courts have invoked the constitutionalized