“Fifty years after ‘Bloody Sunday’ march, struggles endure in Selma”
Extensive WaPo report. … Continue reading
Category Archives: Voting Rights Act
“Cuts to Voting Rights Act calls for protest, trumps Selma celebration, Rev. Jesse Jackson says”
Al.com reports. … Continue reading
“From Selma to Ferguson: 50 Years in the Struggle for Voting Rights”
Dale Ho at Bill Moyers. … Continue reading
“Fifty Years After Bloody Sunday, Voting Rights Are Under Attack”
Ari Berman writes. … Continue reading
“Kris Kobach stands by remarks made to radio show caller”
KC Star: Secretary of State Kris Kobach stands by his comments to a caller on his weekly radio show Sunday that although he thought it unlikely, it would not be “a huge jump” for the Obama administration to call for … Continue reading
“Why ‘Selma is Now’”
I have written this new essay for BillMoyers.com. It begins: When singer-songwriter John Legend recently declared “Selma is now” at the Academy Awards, we could perhaps chalk it up to poetic license. After all, states no longer use literacy tests or … Continue reading
“The Hypocrisy of Celebrating Selma”
Russell Berman for The Atlantic. … Continue reading
Read the DOJ’s 5th Circuit Brief in the Texas Voter ID Case
Here. … Continue reading
“City Election Sea Change Santa Barbara to Initiate New District System This November”
News: Although a few “i”s remain to be dotted and few “t”s to be crossed, the Santa Barbara City Council voted 6-0 to settle a lawsuit charging that the at-large elections City Hall has conducted since 1971 have yielded “racially … Continue reading
“Audio Links: Alabama Law Review Symposium on the Voting Rights Act”
Paul Horwitz: This past Friday, the Alabama Law Review held its annual symposium. This year, the symposium marked the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Voting Rights Act. The speakers discussed its past, especially the civil rights activism–not least the famous … Continue reading
“Fifth Circuit Should Uphold Ruling Striking Down Texas’s Discriminatory Photo ID Law”
Brennan Center press release: Texas’s strict photo ID law violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and was passed by the Texas Legislature with intent to discriminate, argues a brief filed todayin the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals by … Continue reading
“Texas Voters Urge Fifth Circuit to Uphold Ruling Striking Down Texas Voter Photo ID Law”
Release: Today in Veasey v. Abbott, attorneys at the Campaign Legal Center, who serve as co-counsel for plaintiffs Congressman Marc Veasey, LULAC, and a group of Texas voters, filed a brief urging the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold … Continue reading
“50 Years of the Voting Rights Act”
Release: Today the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies released 50 Years of the Voting Rights Act: The State of Race in Politics. The report examines minority voter turnout, racially polarized voting, policy outcomes by race, and the number of … Continue reading
“Does Candidate Race Impact Who Turns Out to Vote?”
AJPS: The forthcoming article “Candidates or Districts? Reevaluating the Role of Race in Voter Turnout” byBernard L. Fraga is summarized by the author here: The recent film “Selma” highlighted the struggle by African-Americans to win voting rights. Yet even as … Continue reading
“Where black voters stand 50 years after the Voting Rights Act was passed”
WaPo: African Americans have come a long way politically over the past half-century, but disparities remain. In the five decades since the passage of the Voting Rights Act, blacks have made significant strides in registering and turning out to vote, … Continue reading
“Proportional Voting Through the Elections Clause: Protecting Voting Rights Post-Shelby County”
Conner Johnston has written this student note for the UCLA Law Review. … Continue reading
“Section 2 Zero-Sums: How the Supreme Court Misconstrued the Voting Rights Act, Limits Minority Representation, and Dangerously Pits Minorities Against Each Other”
Salvador Perez has written this piece for the Stanford Law Review Online. … Continue reading
“Earl Ofari Hutchinson: Why We Still Need a Selma”
Here. … Continue reading
“Fifty Years After Bloody Sunday in Selma, Everything and Nothing Has Changed”
Read Ari Berman. Then you can preorder his book, “Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America.” … Continue reading
“Roberts at 10: Turning Back the Clock on Protections for Racial Equality”
David Gans writes. … Continue reading
Off to University of Alabama Voting Rights Act Symposium
Looking forward to this. I’ll be talking about the Alabama redistricting case, awaiting decision at the Supreme Court. Regular blogging resumes on Monday. … Continue reading
“The Next Attack on Voting Rights; And why Democrats should fight for a constitutional right-to-vote amendment.”
Jamelle Bouie for Slate. … Continue reading
WI Voter ID Opponents File #SCOTUS Reply to Get Court to Take Case
You can read the short reply here. The reply makes a good and important timing point: This case is the only vehicle that guarantees the Court an opportunity to address the constitutional and statutory questions surrounding restrictive voter ID laws before the 2016 … Continue reading
“Trend 1: The rise of majority-minority and near-majority-minority states”
States of Change The Demographic Evolution of the American Electorate, 1974–2060 The demographics of the United States are projected to become much more diverse in the coming decades and will have significant effects on the nation’s voting electorate in … Continue reading
Supreme Court Accepts Supplemental Brief on One Person, One Vote Issue in Alabama Redistricting Case
Today the Supreme Court ordered this brief to be accepted for filing. … Continue reading
Quote of the Day, Oscar Edition
Thank you. Nina Simone said it’s an artist’s duty to reflect the times in which we live. We wrote this song for a film that was based on events that were 50 years ago but we say that Selma is … Continue reading
“Setting the record straight on Selma and ‘Selma’”
Marc Selverstone in WaPo: These conversations show that Johnson encouraged King to focus media attention on voting-rights injustices, leaned hard on aides to seek legal and legislative remedies for those wrongs, and acknowledged the importance of the Selma events — … Continue reading
“New evidence shows election officials are biased against Latino voters”
The Monkey Cage. … Continue reading
“Will the U.S. Supreme Court Weigh in on Wisconsin’s Voter ID Law?”
Express Milwaukee reports. … Continue reading
Federal Court Adopts Plaintiffs’ Districting Plan in Yakima, WA Case for Voting Rights Violation, Rejects Limited Voting Alternatives
The court rejected the plans submitted by both the City and FairVote, going with the plaintiffs’ preferred single-member district plan to resolve Latino vote dilution claims. … Continue reading
“Latino activists consider voting rights lawsuit against Orange County”
KPCC reports. … Continue reading
“Voting rights for minorities threatened, experts say”
Gannett reports. … Continue reading
“John Lewis Reflects on Selma Marches”
CBS reports. … Continue reading
“The Mystery of Lower Voter Registration Rates of Older Black Voters”
Nate Cohn for The UpShot. … Continue reading
“U.S. District Judge to Deliver Keynote at Voting Rights Act Symposium at UA”
Press release: U.S. District Judge Myron H. Thompson will deliver the keynote address for the Alabama Law Review symposium as it marks the 50th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act at noon Feb. 27 at The University of Alabama School … Continue reading
VRAA Reintroduced; Likely Not Going Anywhere in Republican Congress
Details. … Continue reading
“Diverse Coalition of Civil Rights and Legal Groups File Briefs Urging Supreme Court to Address Voter ID as Issue of National Importance”
From the “be careful what you wish for” department: A broad alliance of civil rights and legal groups representing the communities most impacted by Wisconsin’s restrictive voter ID law, as well as all 46 members of the Congressional Black Caucus, … Continue reading
“Civil Rights Leaders Upset Over Non-Voting Rights Act Hearing”
The Dallas Weekly reports. I think in the headline the “Non-” should be modifying hearing not voting rights. … Continue reading
At #SCOTUS, Wisconsin Files Its Voter ID Opposition to Cert. Petition
Read it here. … Continue reading
“Voting Laws Roundup 2015″
Brennan Center: As the early stages of the 2016 presidential race begin, state legislatures are already considering hundreds of laws that could determine access to the ballot. Increased single-party control in state capitals has accompanied a renewed push for voting … Continue reading
“Using Race (Again) in the Struggle for Political Mastery”
Michael Curtis: After their victories in 2010 state legislative elections, Republicans reapportioned a number of state legislatures. They drew districts so that, for later elections, a minority or slim majority of Republican voters for Congress or the state legislature could … Continue reading
Texas Files Partially Redacted Brief in 5th Circuit Voter ID Appeal
Read it here. … Continue reading
“Lynch Pressed on Voting Laws at Confirmation Hearing”
Mike Sacks reports for BLT. … Continue reading
“How to Protect the Vote: Democrats face significant obstacles in the fight to strengthen voting rights”
Ari Berman writes for The Nation. … Continue reading
“From Selma to Citizens United: The contested struggle for one person, one vote”
This item appears at Facing South. … Continue reading
Common Cause to Rep. Goodlatte: “Discrimination Isn’t a Thing of the Past”
Blog post. … Continue reading
“Honor King’s Legacy By Protecting Voting Rights”
Ari Berman: The film Selma movingly chronicles Martin Luther King Jr.’s fight to win the Voting Rights Act (VRA). It ends with King speaking triumphantly on the steps of the Alabama capitol, after marching from Selma to Montgomery. Five months … Continue reading
Rep. Conyers on the VRA and VRAA
WaPo profile: Conyers and House Democrats plan to spend this year drawing attention to ongoing concerns with voting rights after the Supreme Court invalidated parts of the Voting Rights Act in 2013. The court struck down sections of the law … Continue reading
Maureen Dowd NYT Column on “Selma” and LBJ
Here. … Continue reading
The VRAA, as Expected, is Going Nowhere in the New Congress
MSNBC: A top Republican has all but confirmed that Congress won’t move forward with legislation to strengthen the Voting Rights Act (VRA), which was badly weakened by the Supreme Court in 2013. Rep. Bob Goodlatte, who chairs the House Judiciary … Continue reading