Ellen Katz in the Yale Law Journal Online:

Following oral argument in Shelby County v. Holder, Abigail Thernstrom proposed a provocative analogy. Thernstrom, the vice chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and a longtime commentator on voting issues, suggested that places like Shelby County, Alabama might be likened to a patient with a heart problem, and section 5 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) could be seen as the prescribed medication.¹ According to Thernstrom, the medication “helps” at the beginning, but soon it “starts to wreck the patient’s kidneys.” So too, Thernstrom argued, with section 5 of the VRA, a provision she says initially did a lot of good, but, in her view, has been wrecking things in covered jurisdictions for a long time now. Her message is clear: the treatment should be scrapped before it does any more damage to the patient.