Report on Voting Rights in Texas

The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights has this report on "Voting Rights in Texas, 1982-2006." According to the press release, the report was "released in the wake of the derailment by a small group of House Republicans, led by Lynn Westmoreland, R.Ga., of an important vote to renew key protections in a law largely considered the most successful civil rights legislation ever enacted." Its findings are summarized as follows:

[T] the report found that Texas has the second highest number of Justice Department objections to discriminatory voting changes since the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA) was last renewed in 1982. It also found that the state has withdrawn more discriminatory changes than any other covered state after the Justice Department asked for clarification of the effects the changes would have, which the report cites as evidence of the VRA's deterrent effect.

The report found that many jurisdictions flouted the obligation to provide language assistance to voters, including recent examples in: Harris County in 2002 with respect to its Vietnamese voters; Hale County in 2005 with respect to its Spanish voters; and Ector County in 2006 with respect to its Spanish voters.

Posted by tokajid at July 6, 2006 05:29 AM