Civic Register
| 10.18.18
Do We Need a New Voting Rights Act?
Vote to see how others feel about this issue
What’s the story?
- Gerrymandering continues to garner headlines and restrictive voting policies could influence the outcome of 2018 battleground races in at least four states: Georgia, North Dakota, Ohio, and Arkansas.
- In Georgia, Secretary of State – and Republican gubernatorial candidate - Brian Kemp placed 53,000 voter registration applications on a “pending” list—70 percent of them submitted by black voters. (Kemp's office told the AP that the numbers are skewed by "the higher usage of one method of registration among one particular demographic group.")
- In North Dakota, Native Americans are working to contain the fallout of the Supreme Court decision to uphold the state’s controversial voter ID law, which requires voters to present identification that verifies a current residential street address rather than a P.O. box number. Critics are saying SCOTUS’ move harms Native American voters who live on reservations, where residential addresses largely do not exist.
- Voting rights advocates say Republicans are trying to prevent minorities – who overwhelmingly vote Democratic - from casting ballots.
- Republicans argue their efforts are meant to boost voter confidence and combat rampant voter fraud (though numerous studies have found no evidence of widespread voter irregularities).
- Former Vice President Joe Biden said on Thursday that "absolutely, positively, without question" voter suppression is ongoing in the United States.
- So: Is it time for a new Voting Rights Act?
What’s in the current Voting Rights Act?
- The Voting Rights Act of 1965 – signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson – aimed to enforce the 15th Amendment of the Constitution, which stated:
"The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude."
- Section 2 of the Act - which closely followed the language of the 15th amendment - applied a nationwide prohibition against the denial or abridgment of the right to vote on the literacy tests on a nationwide basis.
- The Act contained special enforcement provisions targeted at those areas of the country where Congress believed the potential for discrimination to be the greatest. Under Section 5, covered jurisdictions could not implement any change affecting voting until the Attorney General or the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia determined that the change did not have a discriminatory purpose and would not have a discriminatory effect.
- The Act authorized the U.S. attorney general to investigate the use of poll taxes in state and local elections. Shortly after, in Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections, the Supreme Court held Virginia's poll tax to be unconstitutional under the 14th amendment.
What was the effect of the Act?
“The law had an immediate impact. By the end of 1965, a quarter of a million new black voters had been registered, one-third by Federal examiners. By the end of 1966, only 4 out of the 13 southern states had fewer than 50 percent of African Americans registered to vote. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was readopted and strengthened in 1970, 1975, and 1982,” explains Ourdocuments.gov.
How could a new act expand voting rights?
- “First, states can shift the burden of registration from voters onto the state to make it easy, if not automatic, to register rather than allowing the state to take advantage of every opportunity to knock off applicants and registrants,” Daniel Nichanian is a Senior Fellow at the Justice Collaborative, wrote in an op-ed on NBCNews.
- Return the voting rights of citizens who’ve been incarcerated. Florida, which has had some of the strictest laws restricting the formerly incarcerated from voting, has a new law on the ballot in November.
- Make Election Day a federal holiday so people have time to vote.
- Require employers to grant their workers at least two hours of paid leave to vote in federal elections. This is the crux of the Time Off to Vote Act, introduced in June 2017 by Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-PA), who said, “Voting should not be a luxury that only the well-off can afford. This bill helps ensure that all Americans, regardless of their economic status, are able to exercise the right to vote.”
What do you think?
Amidst allegations of gerrymandering and widespread voter suppression, is it time for Congress to draft a new Voting Rights Act? What would you like to see included? Take action above, then share your thoughts below.
—Josh Herman
(Photo Credit: iStockphoto.com / erhui1979)
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