Supreme Court ready to whack away at our freedom once again (Voting Rights Act)

[Dennis S]

Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act is on the block. Get ready for wholesale dirty tricks and discrimination when the Gang of Five kills it.

http://www.npr.org/2013/02/27/173012038/...rights-act

[cbelt3]

I'd be interested in actual evidence of voting rights abuses in the 2012 election and how they relate to the areas identified as 'special interest areas' (i.e. the South).

There's a pervasive assumption that identification of 'Dixie' or the 'Southern Flag' is somehow a racist identification. I'm susceptible to this opinion myself. But is it true ?

If you dress up wearing a white sheet for Halloween in the north, you're a ghost. In the south, you're a KKK member. Is that assumption valid ?

[Ted King]

cbelt3 wrote:
I'd be interested in actual evidence of voting rights abuses in the 2012 election and how they relate to the areas identified as 'special interest areas' (i.e. the South).

It's not just a matter of actual voting rights abuses (that still happen fairly routinely - "Up, with Chris Hayes" had a discussion on this last week), but there is also the important issue of the number of voting rights abuses that never come to fruition because the presence of the law discourages those abuses. Those may start becoming actual abuses if Section 5 is struck down.

I do think there are flaws in the present voting rights laws, but I don't want to see them swept away with nothing to replace them. I would like to see present law replaced with laws that apply nationwide. If the Supreme Court sweeps Section 5 away, though, I doubt there will be an effective nationwide law passed to replace it and I think the number and degree of abuses will grow.

[Lemon Drop]

Why is is that mostly only former Confederate states feel the need for "strict photo ID laws?"
Somehow the rest of the country votes without these laws, without fraud, without issue.

The issue is not whether voting rights abuses currently exist, but whether the voter fraud these states claim exists actually does in fact exist. So far they have failed to produce evidence of it.

[cbelt3]

Ted-

My understanding (from the NPR bit this morning that I heard) is that the actual law is not in question, but the application of sustained federal oversight for even the most casual changes (The school burned down, we need to do voting at city hall) for certain specially identified voting districts.

FEC and DOJ oversight still exists over ALL voting districts in the US, and the requirements to comply with the law and enforcement of the law are not in question.

Empirically the last time this was looked at, the net results is the legal statement of "once racist, always racist". It's that prejudgemental assumption that I am questioning, and it is the root of the latest case before the Supremes.

[Ted King]

cbelt3 wrote:
Ted-

My understanding (from the NPR bit this morning that I heard) is that the actual law is not in question, but the application of sustained federal oversight for even the most casual changes (The school burned down, we need to do voting at city hall) for certain specially identified voting districts.

I'm pretty sure what is at stake is whether the court will find Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act to be Constitutional; if so, that sure seems to mean that that part of the law is in question.

cbelt3 wrote:
FEC and DOJ oversight still exists over ALL voting districts in the US, and the requirements to comply with the law and enforcement of the law are not in question.

That's true, perhaps that is enough, but people in some jurisdictions are still trying hard to make laws that discriminate in voting and I'm not so sure that without Section 5 that what is left would be sufficient.

[cbelt3]

http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/vot/sec_5/about.php

http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/vot/42u...chor_1973c

Hmm.... I still don't think killing Section 5 is a Voting Armageddon. The 15th amendment remains intact.

[$tevie]

It sounds as if the logic is: after Section 5 was passed as part of the Voting Rights Act, things improved and that means it is not necessary. Which seems like a logical fallacy to me.



And then there's Scalia, who forgot to pull his head out of his arse before he came to work.

One of the more stunning moments came when Justice Antonin Scalia called the Voting Rights Act “the perpetuation of racial entitlement” – a comment that shocked some spectators and underscored the gap between minority advocates and those who view the case through a lens of federal infringement on states’ rights.

http://trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com/2...bOC34.dpbs

[Ted King]

If oral arguments are any kind of indication at all, the court is going to strike down Section 5. I would like to see a law passed that would require all voting jurisdictions to do an assessment on potential discriminatory consequences to show that a sought after change in voting practices will not result in substantial discrimination against any race, ethnicity, gender or age group (after age 18) and make that assessment publicly available for full public review. If someone analyzes the assessment and thinks it is insufficient, they can appeal to the DOJ for the DOJ to do its own review of the assessment and if it is found insufficient, it must be adjusted or else the DOJ would block its implementation by court injunction.

[cbelt3]

Ted-
That's an interesting concept. However... what it does is establish the assumption that, without constant monitoring at a federal level, voting rights compliance will never be maintained. The law as it stands assumed that voting compliance would be suspect in many areas, and established a time in which monitoring was necessary.

The state's empirical contention is that monitoring is no longer necessary, and the bureaucratic oversight and effort is no longer required.

Think of it as a difference between 'electoral probation' and 'electoral predator' marking.

Your point is better taken, though. If populations migrate (and have) over time, and the status of voting rights is still considered 'shaky', then it would be most fair for a periodic audit of each voting district across the nation.