It's clear that the partisan lines were drawn with this decision by the Court. Conservatives on One Side, Liberals and Neo-Progressives on the Other. It's obvious where everyone stood.
You can see the Senators such as Lyndsay Graham and Governors such as Jan Brewer are doing the Snoopy Dance of Happiness.
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/...
Graham: “Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act was a necessary tool to preserve voting rights, but due to the reform and advances in South Carolina election law, it is no longer necessary," he said in a statement. "The Supreme Court noted this tremendous progress in South Carolina’s electoral system and it was the underpinning of their decision. I concur with the Court that our state has made tremendous progress."
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/...
Brewer: "It's hampered us for a long time," Brewer told reporters Tuesday. "It's another blow. it's another strike for states rights. I think we were being punished by the Voting Rights Act for indiscretions, for bad things that took place decades ago and those don't take place any longer. We have grown and so it was the right thing to do so I'm pleased."
This coming from the Governor of the State that Houses
Sheriff Joe Arpaio who is up to bushy eye-brows in
Discrimination Suits.
Yeah, that stuff used to happen years ago and doesn't take place any longer... except that it does, and everyone knows it.
It's ironic that the SCOTUS came down with this decision on the same week, and frankly the same day, that Paula Deen went on the Today Show where Matt Lauer asked her - "Would You have Fired You (for using the N-word Repeatedly)?"
Her answer of course was "No, because I know me, and those people who truly know me have stood by me." She also argued that she was only prejudiced against "Thieves and Liars" - ok, so what makes you think all the "Theives and Liars" are Black? And y'know what a better word for "Theives and Liars" might be than the N-Word?
"Thieves and Liars".
I'm just saying.
The fact is that if another White person hadn't outed Deen in a discrimination suit for her behind-the-scenes statements, we wouldn't even be discussing her at all. Just like most of modern day discrimination, those who partake in it a) Hide behind closed doors and euphemisms and b) Sometimes completely fail to realize just how bigoted their own actions and statements are.
Just like Deen.
In her dissent Justice Ginsburg essentially made mince meat of the Majority Decision in this case. http://www.supremecourt.gov/...
In fact, Congress found there were more DOJ objections between 1982 and 2004 (626) than there were between 1965 and the 1982 reauthorization (490). 1 Voting Rights Act: Evidence of Continued Need, Hearing before the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House Committee on the Judiciary, 109th Cong., 2d Sess., p. 172 (2006) (hereinafter Evidence of Continued Need). All told, between 1982 and 2006, DOJ objections blocked over 700 voting changes based on a determination that the changes were discriminatory. H. R. Rep. No. 109–478, at 21. Congress found that the majority of DOJ objections included findings of discriminatory intent, see 679 F. 3d, at 867, and that the changes blocked by preclearance were “calculated decisions to keep minority voters from fully participating in the political process.” H. R. Rep. 109–478, at 21. On top of that, over the same time period the DOJ and private plaintiffs succeeded in more than 100 actions to enforce the §5 preclearance requirements.
Congress also received evidence that litigation under §2 of the VRA was an inadequate substitute for preclearance in the covered jurisdictions. Litigation occurs only after the fact, when the illegal voting scheme has already been put in place and individuals have been elected pursuant to it, thereby gaining the advantages of incumbency.
Ginsburg also gave examples of current and ongoing Discriminatory Practices.
In 2001, the mayor and all-white five-member Board of Aldermen of Kilmichael, Mississippi, abruptly canceled the town’s election after “an unprecedented number” of African-American candidates announced they were running for office. DOJ required an election, and the town elected its first black mayor and three black aldermen. Id., at 36–37.
In 2006, this Court found that Texas’ attempt to redraw a congressional district to reduce the strength of Latino voters bore “the mark of intentional discrimination that could give rise to an equal protection violation,” and ordered the district redrawn in compliance with the VRA. League of United Latin American Citizens v. Perry , 548 U. S. 399, 440 (2006). In response, Texas sought to undermine this Court’s order by curtailing early voting in the district, but was blocked by an action to enforce the §5 preclearance requirement. See Order in League of United Latin American Citizens v. Texas , No. 06–cv–1046 (WD Tex.), Doc. 8.
In 2003, after African-Americans won a majority of the seats on the school board for the first time in history, Charleston County, South Carolina (What was that again Senator Graham?), proposed an at-large voting mechanism for the board. The proposal, made without consulting any of the African-American members of the school board, was found to be an “‘exact replica’ ” of an earlier voting scheme that, a federal court had determined, violated the VRA. 811 F. Supp. 2d 424, 483 (DDC 2011). See also S. Rep. No. 109–295, at 309. DOJ invoked §5 to block the proposal.
In 1993, the City of Millen, Georgia, proposed to delay the election in a majority-black district by two dissenting years, leaving that district without representation on the city council while the neighboring majority white district would have three representatives. 1 Section 5 Hearing 744. DOJ blocked the proposal. The county then sought to move a polling place from a predominantly black neighborhood in the city to an inaccessible location in a predominantly white neighborhood outside city limits. Id., at 816.
In 2004, Waller County, Texas, threatened to prosecute two black students after they announced their intention to run for office. The county then attempted to reduce the avail ability of early voting in that election at polling places near a historically black university. 679 F. 3d, at 865–866.
In 1990, Dallas County, Alabama, whose county seat is the City of Selma, sought to purge its voter rolls of many black voters . DOJ rejected the purge as discriminatory, noting that it would have disqualified many citizens from voting “simply because they failed to pick up or return a voter update form, when there was no valid requirement that they do so.” 1 Section 5 Hearing 356.
So, it's not true that these types of efforts are simply "things of the past" they are still happening - sometimes behind closed doors, sometimes not - and in fact, they are happening
more often than they used to be.
And within a couple hours of the decision we had Texas and Alabama going ahead and implementing their new restrictive Voter ID Laws and Redistricting Schemes specifically.
As we all know the GOP is demographically doomed, and that their efforts at outreach to minority constituents are pathetic and laughable.
But here's the thing. One of the biggest motivations for minority turnout in the last election wasn't just the fact that Barack Obama was again on the ballot - it was also in defiance of the outrageous attempts to disenfranchise people from the Vote particularly in some of the States That Weren't Covered by §5 like Florida, Ohio and Wisconsin.
As the 2012 election approached, Republican governors and legislators in battleground states across the country rushed to enact restrictive Voter ID laws, to eliminate election-day registration and to limit early voting. Those were just some of the initiatives that the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People identified as “an onslaught of restrictive measures across the country designed to stem electoral strength among communities of color.”
...
According to a new study produced by Brookings Institution demographer William Frey for the Associated Press, 2012 turnout was down overall from 2004 and 2008. But African-American turnout does not appear to have declined at the same rate as white turnout.
Via the AP
Romney would have erased Obama’s nearly 5 million-vote victory margin and narrowly won the popular vote if voters had turned out as they did in 2004, according to Frey’s analysis. Then, white turnout was slightly higher and black voting lower.
More significantly, the battleground states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Florida and Colorado would have tipped in favor of Romney, handing him the presidency if the outcome of other states remained the same.
Headlines suggested that African-American turnout levels may actually have exceeded white turnout levels, which would be a historic first. Frey tells MSNBC that he'll need to analyze more census data -- some of which is not yet available -- to confirm whether this was the case.
But the data that is available points to the critical conclusion: While overall turnout dropped from 2008 to 2012, African-American turnout remained steady at 13 percent.
Read more: How Voter Backlash Against Voter Suppression Is Changing Our Politics | The Nation http://www.thenation.com/...
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We've all been expecting that for the 2014 mid-terms and elections in the future that don't have "Barack Obama" on the ballot, the minority (and overall Democratic) turnout would not meet the same levels it reached in 2012.
That may not be the case.
In a way a lack of preclearance acted as a motivating factor for Black and Latinos who REFUSED to let their Vote be taken away. With every Action there is often a Reaction and I suspect this will be a reaction that may begin a tipping point for the GOP. Just where do they go from here? They've shown with this decision who they are, and what they're about. They want to deny the Demographic Realities and maintain an electoral dominance that is simply not earned and not deserved.
We're not standing for it. Not even a little bit. Not only has the GOP just lost the minority vote - FOREVER - they've really, REALLY Pissed Us Off. They're going to regret that.
Vyan