voting rights

Voting Rights Act trial to begin in North Carolina

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The New York Times today has a front page explainer of the Voting Rights Act trial that gets underway in North Carolina on Monday. Voting Rights Legacy of the ’60s Heads to Court as North Carolina Law Is Tested:

A federal trial opening in Winston-Salem on Monday is meant to determine whether recent, sweeping changes in the state’s election laws discriminate against black voters. These changes were adopted by the Republican-dominated state legislature in 2013, immediately after the United States Supreme Court struck down the heart of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 when it ended a requirement that nine states with histories of discrimination, including North Carolina, get federal approval before altering their election laws.

But the case, as well as one involving a Texas law requiring voters to show a photo ID, could have far wider repercussions, legal experts say — helping to define the scope of voting rights protections across the country in the coming presidential election and beyond.

WillimaBarberThe contested measures in North Carolina include reduced early voting days, an end to same-day registration and an end to a program to preregister high school students. They are a far cry from the violent intimidation and poll taxes of the Jim Crow era. Still, few issues are more highly charged than voting rights in the old Confederate states, where the murder of civil rights workers and the brutal police attack on Alabama marchers galvanized Congress to pass the 1965 act, and the trial is fanning old emotions.

“This is our Selma,” said William J. Barber II, president of the North Carolina N.A.A.C.P. [and Moral Mondays Movement (above)], of the election changes in the state. His group brought the lawsuit, alongside the League of Women Voters, a group of college students and the Department of Justice.

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Florida Supreme Court invalidates 8 congressional districts

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On Thursday, the Florida Supreme Court struck down eight congressional districts in Florida gerrymandered to benefit Republicans. the Tallahassee Democrat reports, State Supreme Court strikes down congressional districts:

The_Gerry-Mander_EditA bitterly divided Florida Supreme Court threw out eight congressional districts Thursday in a long-awaited ruling, ordering the Legislature to redraw the lines within the next 100 days.

The 5-2 decision, which featured a split between the court’s more-liberal majority and its conservative minority, will likely force lawmakers to return to Tallahassee for their third session of the year. It also marked the second time that justices had tossed out a map drawn by the Republican-dominated Legislature as part of the 2012 redistricting process.

In an opinion written by Justice Barbara Pariente, the majority found that Leon County Circuit Judge Terry Lewis was correct to find that the congressional map approved as part of the once-a-decade redistricting process was corrupted by the efforts of Republican political consultants — violating an anti-gerrymandering “Fair Districts” constitutional amendment voters approved in 2010.

But Pariente argued that Lewis was essentially too timid in his ruling and that he deferred to lawmakers too much when deciding which districts should and shouldn’t be thrown out and how drastic any changes should be.

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New report on the ‘Health of State Democracies’

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The Center for American Progress Action Fund released a report today rating the “Health of State Democracies.” Explore the report and data on the interactive: www.healthofstatedemocracies.org. Here are summary reports. The Health of State Democracies, and Liberty and Justice for All? A 50-State Look at the Health of State Democracies.

The Washington Post’s Niraj Chokshi reports, Is this cold, rural state home to the nation’s healthiest democracy?:

VotersOne of the nation’s whitest, coldest and most rural states may have a new superlative to add to the list: most democratic.

After taking 22 factors into account, Maine’s democracy ranks healthiest in the nation in a new report from the Center for American Progress Action Fund, the advocacy wing of the liberal Center for American Progress. Alabama’s was weakest, though even top-ranking Maine was far from perfect.

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Measuring democracy is, of course, subjective — to some, requiring identification to vote makes democracies stronger, while others view it as a barrier, a solution in search of a problem. But if broad access to voting, equal representation in state government and a limited concentration of influence over the political system is your idea of a healthy democracy, then Maine is the state for you.

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Now about that dual election system in Kansas and Arizona

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NoVoteIt was just short of a year ago that I told you about the lawsuit filed by the ACLU and League of Women Voters against Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach in Kansas state court, Belenky v. Kobach, seeking an injunction against the “dual election system” established by Kobach to disenfranchise citizens of their right to vote in state and local elections if they had registered to vote using the federal voter registration form (Arizona Secretary of State Ken “Birther” Bennett established a similar dual election system in Arizona).

Because there was a parallel case in another court, Kobach v. U.S. Election Assistance Commission in the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, and the closeness of the primary election date, Shawnee County District Court Judge Franklin Theis denied the injunction. The judge did not rule on the merits of the case. Kansas judge approves dual election system in Kansas. Both Kansas and Arizona conducted dual elections in 2014 based upon the voter registration form that voters used to register to vote.

A unanimous panel of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the Election Assistance Commission in Kobach v. U.S. Election Assistance Commission. On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court denied the appeal from this order without comment, a surprising turn of events given that Justice Antonin Scalia suggested the convoluted legal process to Kansas and Arizona in his earlier Supreme Court opinion in Arizona v. The Inter Tribal Council of Arizona, Inc.

So what is the status of Belenky v. Kobach (2013-CV-001331) in Kansas state court?

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Congressional Democrats to introduce bill to restore the Voting Rights Act of 1965

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Voting-RightsTomorrow marks two years since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA) in Shelby County v. Holder. (This has the effect of suspending Section 5 pre-clearance review by the Department of Justice.).

Chief Justice Roberts’ opinion in Shelby County v. Holder opened the floodgates to new GOP voter suppression efforts in those covered jurisdictions within hours of the decision. After Ruling, States Rush to Enact Voting Laws.

Research from earlier this year demonstrates just how full-o’-crap Justice Roberts’ opinion was, as the New York Times editorialized in Voting Rights, by the Numbers.

At the 50th anniversary of of “Bloody Sunday” in Selma, Alabama in March of this year, President Obama called upon members of Congress to restore the VRA. Obama at Selma: ‘Pledge to make it their mission to restore the Voting Rights Act this year’.

Tomorrow, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) — an icon of the Civil Rights Movement who was nearly beaten to death in Selma on “Bloody Sunday” — will introduce the bill to restore the VRA. (The U.S. Supreme Court could announce its opinion in Arizona Legislature v. Arizona Independent Redistriciting Commission tomorrow as well).

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