The Missouri Supreme Court has already deemed that requiring voters to produce government-issued photo identification flies in the face of the state constitution.

Yet, during the last remaining days of the 94th General Assembly, a push has been launched to call for an election to change the state constitution so that Missouri would have the voter ID law.

If the election is called, voters would go to the polls later this year to decide the issue.

Why the extra requirement?

If Missouri had cases of voter impersonation linked to voter fraud, then perhaps the measure would be necessary. But Secretary of State Robin Carnahan says that’s not the case. In fact, there has never been a case in Missouri. She says the problems with voting that do exist would not be fixed by requiring a photo ID.

A voter ID bill in Indiana went to the U.S. Supreme Court. That court ruled that states could require voters to present a government-issued photo ID to cast a ballot. Consequently, during the May 6 presidential primary election, at least a dozen elderly nuns, several recently married women who changed their names when they married and a number of students with out-of-state driver’s licenses were not allowed to cast ballots.

Those without photo ID generally are women, the elderly or the poor.

We have enough bureaucracy.

Heaping on one more barrier, or making the system even more prohibitive for some, smacks of political gamesmanship.

Let’s get down to taking care of problems that are real.