CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) -- Civil rights groups have sent a second letter to the U.S. Justice Department asking that the agency block South Carolina's new voter ID law.

The national and state American Civil Liberties Union as well as the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights under Law wrote this week saying the law would affect more than 215,000 voters, many of them minority, elderly or disabled.

The groups and several others wrote a similar letter in August.

An attorney with the ACLU Voting Rights Project, Katie O'Connor, says the new law could disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of the voters who had cast ballots last year. O'Conner says the scheme is unparalleled in state history since the 1960s.

The law requires a driver's license or one of several other forms of photo ID to vote.

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