The Washington Post has an editorial today pronouncing Virginia’s law banning convicted felons who have completed their sentences from being able to vote a “disgrace.” Why is it a disgrace? Because, the Post says, they have paid their “debt to society.” That is untrue, because the state determines what that debt should be, not the Washington Post.

I don’t necessarily agree that convicted felons should lose the right to vote forever, but that is a policy decision. Virginia  and Kentucky take the position that a felon’s debt to society for committing a serious crime includes forfeiting the right to vote. Just as each state decides what  prison terms or fines are appropriate punishment for specific crimes, they also decide what “debt” is owed to society by felons. The states decide this because the debt, after all, is owed to them.

Ex-felons in other states may have paid their debts to society, but employers can and do choose not to hire them, especially in jobs involving trust. A former embezzler is not going to be hired to work at a bank; a convicted drug dealer who has paid his “debt” will probably not find work at a pharmacy. Some aspects of those debts take a lifetime to pay. The Post does not think this is “disgraceful,” one hopes: an employer has every right to consider past conduct in deciding whether to entrust future responsibilities.

So does a state. Virginia and Kentucky have decided that citizens who engage in major law-breaking have shown insufficient respect for the rule of law and their civic duties to be entrusted with full participation in the democratic process. Tough? Definitely. Unfair? That’s a matter of opinion. Unethical? Disgraceful?

No.

Felons in Virginia and Kentucky choose their debt when they break the law. The debt includes the loss of voting rights unless and until the governor restores them. They accepted the terms of the debt, and it is hardly wrong or “disgraceful” for them to be held to it.