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Texas has one of the most restrictive voter ID laws in the nation. In 2012 a federal court struck down Texas' ID law, ruling it would potentially disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of minority voters.

But that federal decision was invalidated when the Supreme Court last year ruled part of the Voting Rights Act unconstitutional. So now Texas is test driving its Voter ID law.

Texas Judges are accustomed to a certain level of respect, even deference as they go about their daily business in the Lone Star State. So imagine Judge Sandra Watts' surprise when she went to cast her vote last week and was told there was a problem.

"What I have used for voter registration and identification for the last 52 years was not sufficient yesterday when I went to vote," Watts says.

Why? Because Watts' name on her driver's license lists her maiden name as her middle name. But on the state voting rolls, her real middle name is there, and that's difference enough to cause a problem.

"This is the first time I have ever had a problem voting," she says. "And so why would I want to vote provisional ballot when I've been voting regular ballot for the last 49 years?"

Sandra Watts stomped out of her polling place and called the local Corpus Christi TV station KIII. Her voting problems became the lead story that night.

The original Justice Department concern with Texas' Voter ID law involved its discriminatory effect on the state's poor and minority voters. In 2012 a federal court ruled it unconstitutional on that basis, but that ruling was itself invalidated last year when the U.S. Supreme Court struck down part of the Voting Rights Act, and with that Texas' Voter ID law was back from the dead. So it's come as a surprise how, in practice, the law has also been a problem for Texas women.

Soon after Judge Watts went public, the Democratic candidate for governor, state Sen. Wendy Davis, also was forced to sign an affidavit before she could vote. Married women, divorced women anything that involves changing or adjusting your name could be problem.

"What the law says is in two parts," says Toni Pippins-Poole, the elections administrator for the city of Dallas. "You must have a photo ID and that photo ID has to be one of the listed categories."

For example, it is fine to use a concealed handgun carry permit to vote, but a student can't use his or her university photo ID as they could before. Texas Democrats complain that's because those who carry concealed tend to vote Republican while university students tend to vote Democratic.

"The second part of the photo ID bill is that the name on the ID that you are presenting has to be identical; exactly match what we have on the official list of registered voters," Pippins-Poole says. She knows the real test is next year's congressional elections, and she's concerned about elderly voters.

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