Supreme Court Hears Arizona Voting Law Case

 

Source: nbcnews.com

What Is Voting Rights Act?

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 aimed to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that prevented African Americans from exercising their right to vote as guaranteed under the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Voting Rights Act is considered one of the most far-reaching pieces of civil rights legislation in U.S. history.

What Happened Back in 1960’s?

Lyndon B. Johnson assumed the presidency in November 1963 upon the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. After the Civil War, the 15th Amendment, ratified in 1870, barred states from denying a male citizen the right to vote based on “race, color or previous condition of servitude.” Nonetheless, in the consequent decades, various discriminatory practices were used to prevent African Americans, particularly those in the South, from exercising their right to vote.

During the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s, voting rights activists in the South were subjected to various forms of mistreatment and violence. One event that outraged many Americans occurred on March 7, 1965, when peaceful participants in a Selma to Montgomery march for voting rights were met by Alabama state troopers who attacked them with nightsticks, tear gas and whips after they refused to turn back.

In the wake of the shocking incident, Johnson called for inclusive voting rights legislation. In a speech to a joint session of Congress on March 15, 1965, the president outlined the devious ways in which election officials denied African American citizens the votes.


Literacy Tests

Black people attempting to vote often were told by election officials that they had gotten the date, time or polling place wrong, that they possessed insufficient literacy skills or that they had filled out an application incorrectly.


Voting Rights Act Signed Into Law

The voting rights bill was passed in the U.S. Senate by on May 26, 1965. After debating the bill for more than a month, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the bill by a vote on July 9. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law on August 6, 1965.

The act banned the use of literacy tests, provided for federal oversight of voter registration in areas where less than 50 percent of the non-white population had not registered to vote, and authorized the U.S. attorney general to investigate the use of poll taxes in state and local elections. In 1964, the 24th Amendment made poll taxes illegal in federal elections; poll taxes in state elections were banned in 1966 by the U.S. Supreme Court.


Complications in Voting Rights Law

The Voting Right Law included more general protections. Section 5 made states or localities demonstrate that changes wouldn’t harm minority voting rights, while Section 2 requires the challengers to show that practices have racially discriminatory effects. As a result, Section 2 lawsuits are complex, expensive and unpredictable, typically requiring detailed statistical analysis of local voting behavior and evidence about a location’s history and socioeconomic conditions.

Section 4(b) defines the eligible districts as ones that had a voting test in place as of November 1, 1964 and less than 50% turnout for the 1964 presidential election. Such districts must prove to the Attorney General or a three-judge panel of a Washington, D.C. district court that the change "neither has the purpose nor will have the effect" of negatively impacting any individual's right to vote based on race or minority status.

Recent Cases

In 2013 Shelby County, Alabama, filed suit in district court and sought both a declaratory judgment that Section 5 and Section 4(b) are unconstitutional. The Supreme Court’s decision in Shelby County v. Holder effectively nullified Section 5, leaving Section 2 for preventing racial discrimination in voting.

Recent Arizona laws banning ballot-collection and out-of-precinct voting impose substantial burdens on Black, Latino and Native American voters who have been intentionally targeted for suppression by state lawmakers.

The Democratic National Committee sued, claiming those rules violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act because they burdened minority voters who were more likely to live in areas where postal service and transportation are difficult. The state appealed, claiming that whatever burden is imposed by the restrictions is race-neutral and not substantial enough to qualify as discriminatory.

Brnovich, Arizona district Attorney General that the voting policies were needed for the “sacred duty” of protecting the right to vote and maintaining public confidence in the results. Brnovich said. “Restricting early ballot collections by third parties, including political operatives, protects against voter coercion and preserves ballot secrecy.

Whatever the court decides will determine more than the fate of the Arizona laws, but will set the standard for future claims of racially motivated voting laws under Section 2.

Written by - Abija PB.

Edited by - Gunika Manchanda