The Cleveland Plain Dealer offers Edwards Hopes for Independents Day.

The Weekly Standard offers this detailed article on the 527 controversy at the FEC. While I appreciate the article’s link to my blog, it misstates my institutional affiliation. UPDATE: My affiliation has been fixed on the web version, but the print version will still list me as a UCLA professor, not a Loyola Law School professor.

Newsday offers this editorial.

Tomorrow’s New York Times will contain this front-page report.

The Los Angeles Times offers this report.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution offers this report.

See this A.P. report on the Chief Justice’s new book.

As part of the maneuvering over passage of a bill providing immunity to gun manufacturers for certain tort suits, Senate majority leader Bill Frist introduced an amendment that would renew the preclearance provisions of the Voting Rights Act. Here’s a snippet from a New York Times report:

Dr. Frist’s voting rights amendment, meanwhile, caught many lawmakers off guard. Dr. Frist said he decided to introduce the measure, which would have made permanent certain sections of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, after a recent trip to Alabama and Tennessee with Representative John Lewis, Democrat of Georgia, a civil rights leader. The act is set to expire in 2007. The effort fell apart after Mr. Lewis issued a statement calling Dr. Frist’s maneuver admirable, but premature.
Other Democrats were not so generous; they called the move a political ploy to give Republicans a chance to demonstrate their commitment to civil rights, while forcing Democrats who oppose the gun bill to vote against an issue dear to them.
“It’s a convenient way to play `gotcha,’ ” said Senator Jon Corzine, Democrat of New Jersey.

Ed Still has some other coverage of this issue here.
To the extent that Senators are serious about moving such legislation, they need to move very carefully. Because it is just about inevitable that a renewed preclearance provision would be challenged in court as exceeding Congressional power to enact legislation under its powers granted by the 14th and 15th amendments, Congress will need to craft a careful evidentiary record showing that the legislation is “congruent and proportional” to covered jurisdictions’ violations of the voting rights of protected minority groups. Congress might also try alternative bases of power, such as the Guarantee Clause. (I consider these issues in in this working paper.) In any case, renewal will require careful consideration by Congress if Congress wants its legislation upheld by the courts.

See this NJ.com report.

See this report in the Cincinnati Enquirer.

See this news from Minnesota.

Following up on this development, see news stories here, here (with a strong defense of incumbency protection by the Mass. House Speaker), and here (indicating that the state does not plan to appeal the ruling). Thanks to Bill McGeveran for the pointers.

The Business Gazette offers this report on federal campaign financing out of Maryland.

A.P. offers this report. Thanks to David Ettinger for the pointer.