If you are among the 44.5% percent of North Carolina voters who during 2018 cast a ballot in opposition to the establishment of a voter ID requirement in this state, you still should be somewhat troubled by what happened last week when a federal judge, one who was appointed and not elected, kicked aside that requirement with the snap of a finger.

If, as does this newspaper, you advocate in favor of a voter ID law, and believed that would happen after 55.5% of North Carolina voters voted in favor, then you have a right to be angry.

In effect, when U.S. District Court Judge Loretta Biggs blocked implementation of the voter ID law, which would have been used for the first time in the March 3 primary, she disenfranchised a little more than 2 million voters who voted in favor of the law in what is clearly an attempt to legislate from the bench.

Perhaps more troublesome was Biggs’ disjointed explanation: She seemed not bothered at all by the law itself, which is tremendously generous in what it permits as a valid voter ID, but instead spoke of North Carolina’s “sordid history” when it comes to voter ID law.

She essentially said she doesn’t trust the law because of past transgressions by Republicans, who are in fact guilty of overreaching in this pursuit with a goal to depress the votes of those, primarily minorities, who are most likely to vote in favor of Democratic candidates. She also was troubled by the architects of the law, primarily lawmakers, duly elected we suppose, because of their previous efforts to construct a voter ID law that time and again was determined to be unconstitutional.

Biggs didn’t actually detail what she perceived as flaws in the law itself that presumably would strip some state residents of their right to cast a ballot. We will say again, few things are easier to do than to vote in North Carolina, which offers an extended early voting period, accommodates those who must register at the last minute, and for the foreseeable future does not require any photo ID.

But even if that law were implemented, we are unfamiliar with those who simply cannot find a photo ID with which to cast a ballot. Who are these people? We would love to meet them.

The state, under the law, would provide a photo ID for free — and the overwhelmingly majority of people already possess one. Navigating life without a photo ID is what is difficult.

What is required to vote, now and even after a voter ID is established, is the desire to do so. That is what is typically missing when eligible voters sit out elections.

Josh Stein, the state’s Democratic attorney general, said Wednesday he would do his duty and appeal Biggs’ decision, but said he would delay any action until after the March 3 primary, saying that a rush job would just add to the confusion.

So it appears that in North Carolina, the comfort that a photo ID would have provided will be absent yet again for the primary. Elections here are rarely decided by ideas, but instead turn on which candidate has the deepest pocket and can haul the most voters to the polls, who then dutifully do as they are told to do.

That is a practice that would not have been eliminated by the photo ID requirement, but at least would have been inhibited. We all see the local governments that the absence of a voter ID have saddled us with, and we will continue to wonder what might have been had one been implemented.

— The Robesonian