The Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA) is one of the main American civil rights reforms of the 1960s. It outlawed the literacy tests, poll taxes and other devices that the Jim Crow South used to greatly limit the black vote. It is what Medgar Evers, Freedom Summer, Selma and those fire hoses were mainly about – the right to vote.
President Johnson called the VRA:
a triumph for freedom as huge as any victory that has ever been won on any battlefield
The VRA has not only allowed way more blacks to vote, but also more Native Americans and Latinos: it outlaws practices that in effect limit voting by race or language.
In 2006 Congress, after holding long hearings to see if the VRA was still necessary, voted to extend it by 25 years. Over 90% voted for the extension. A Republican President Bush signed it into law.
On June 25th 2013 the Supreme Court, in a 5 to 4 decision, gravely weakened that extension. Chief Justice Roberts said that it was “based on 40-year-old facts having no logical relationship to the present day.” Congress had used facts from 1975 to determine which states and counties need oversight by the Justice Department when changing voting laws and practices.
Congress could update the VRA to satisfy the Court, but that seems unlikely any time soon: the Republicans firmly control the House. The difference between 2006 and 2013 for the Repubicans is one of demographics. The election and re-election of President Obama show that the white vote is no longer enough. That will become more and more true with each passing year.
That is why the Republicans in 2012 passed laws to limit voting – voter ID, cutting back on early voting, changing voting hours, etc. The VRA kept the Deep South, Texas, Arizona, Virginia, North Carolina, Alaska, New York City and some other places from doing that, but now with the new ruling they can – just in time for 2016.
Blacks and others can still challenge these laws under the VRA in court, that part of the VRA is still in effect, but that takes time and does not always work.
We have been here before: In 1876 the Supreme Court gravely weakened the laws Congress passed to carry out the Fifteenth Amendment, the amendment that gave black men the right to vote. The Court said the laws were not specific enough.
Even the Fifteenth Amendment itself was a fatally flawed compromise: some wanted it to outlaw poll taxes and literacy tests. Blacks wanted national voter registration to protect their right to vote.
By the 1890s the South pushed through laws to limit black voting with poll taxes and literacy tests. The South did this in part to break up an alliance between blacks and poor whites. The Klan did their part by using violence to stop blacks from voting.
Which brings us all the way to the 1960s – and the Voting Rights Act.
See also:
I was shocked by the SCOTUS ruling on this. I was not shocked by the ruling on DOMA.
Obama cheered the DOMA repeal, but dismayed by the VRA ruling. He and I do agree on something.
I was particularly incensed by Justice Scalia. He has opined that the vote by Congress to extend the VRA provisions did not indicate their true intentions and dismissed the validity of the Congressional vote. I am not sure that the SCOTUS truly demonstrated that the VRA provision was unconstitutional. The very next day, he tried to uphold the congressional vote on DOMA which was decided to be unconstitutional.
Such an about face on the validity of Congress completely erased any confidence that I have in the man. He is a bad apple and should be removed.
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Doesn’t this affirm the need to reassess the guidelines of the Voting Rights Act to make it more effective in today’s climate?
Is it anymore unlikely to update it today than to pass it in 1965?
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I would say yes. It is more difficult today. Many Americans & most Congressmen either believe we are already post-racial or secretly harbour a desire to re-disenfranchise.
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I can’t believe sellout Uncle Tommy Clarence Thomas sat there and let the Klu Klux Kourt struck down the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Now the South could take advantage of this and suppress the votes of minorities to their own benefit. And that Justice Scalia, he is to blame for this too!
I can’t believe this the KKK ”Supreme Court” did this. The South will do whatever it can to suppress the minority vote and win elections based on the vote of White, Republican voters,
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The VRA is history – unless enough whites come to understand that they need to champion minority rights NOW to protect their own children and grandchildren. Based on current trends, that seems unlikely.
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Clarence Thomas is even more against the VRA than Scalia or Roberts.
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abagond:
“Clarence Thomas is even more against the VRA than Scalia or Roberts.”
Sheesh, talk about self hatred, i guess a black person, pissed in his cereal in his youth. -_-
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Jefe,
So in 1965 most recognized racism was a problem or didn’t want to disenfranchise black voters?
Most white people, no matter the time frame, won’t recognize racism is a problem until black people make it a problem for them.
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I read a headline yesterday that read, “Gays Win While Blacks Lose Ground in Historic Rulings…” But the Voting Rights Act isn’t about black people or even other minorities…It’s about everyone’s right to have a fair opportunity to cast his/her vote. It has helped uneducated white men and women just as well.
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and striking down DOMA is not about gay people but everyone’s right to marry who they want.
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Well, may I suggest that all Black adults arm themselves NOW while the brother is in office? They don’t want us to vote because whites simply see us as neither citizen nor human. This is their scramble to reduce the effect of the aging and shrinking white vote. They’d shoot us dead ( better yet, shoot themselves) before treating us. LYou heard what Piggy Deen said…
And if you want get one legally, go Black Market.
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resw77, Well said and that is why I am completely against the ruling against the VRA. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was put in place so that people’s right to vote isn’t suppressed. For years in the South, senators had poor Whites and Blacks do a poll tax or literacy test before voting. Many Blacks and poor Whites couldn’t read or write and were poor so the literacy tests and this kept many poor Whites and Blacks from voting in the South.
The only people happy with this ruling are racist Whites and brainwashed Blacks like Uncle Tommy sellout Clarence Thomas. Man, I can’t stand Clarence Thomas. Whenever we make progress and gains in race relations like electing President Obama in 2008, we go always go two steps back in race relations.
I hope Clarence Thomas pays for this!
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In the 1960s, quite a few whites, esp from the North, also joined in to fight Jim Crow. Perhaps after seeing the naked racism in the South, something clicked in their brains. (It is funny that they didn’t always notice the blockbusting segregation white flight & sundown towns just down the road from them).
But in the 2010s, many of them believe that the USA is post racial, more colour blind, & fail to see the disenfranchisement still going on. & They seem not to suspect what Shelby county & other places have up their sleeve. Maybe they might target Hispanics more too.
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I find it very disturbing how much more exposure the DOMA decision got on network news. The huge retreat on the VRA got barely a footnote while there was a veritable orgy of coverage on gay marriage. It is a comment on how racial civil rights is seen in this country: unless it bleeds–like the Trayvon Martin case–network news has little regard for it.
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@Peanut
”I called it, didn’t I call it? I told yall on the other thread you better be prepared and wake up cuz come 2016, and obama is out of office, it’s all downhill from there…yall better wake up. get yourself together, get your passport and get organized…i’m serious.”
I agree with you. Things will get worse for Black people when Obama gets out of office in 2017. The GOP senators and their allies want to bring segregation and Jim Crow back. No, we aren’t living in a postracial America, America is just as racist as ever before! I am planning on getting my passport ready too.
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I’m a white lesbian, and I also find it disturbing how much more exposure the DOMA decision got than the VRA decision in the media. The extreme focus on same sex marriage over the past several years shows how the LGBTQ movement has become increasingly mainstream, moderate, and removed from other struggles for justice. Same sex marriage most benefits affluent, monogamous, WHITE, non-transgender gays and lesbians: in other words, the most privileged folks in the community. Measures that would be of more benefit to poor, trans, Black, and Latino/a members of the community are repeatedly sidelined–measures like a nondiscrimination act that protects LGBTQ people’s access to employment and housing, increased money on AIDS research and treatment, or something to actually protect queer folks from the violence of homophobic bigots. One out of eight transgender women of color eventually gets murdered. Abagond has discussed this before on his blog, but how often is this mentioned by mainstream LGBTQ group or the media? So basically, I see the same pattern of white supremacy that causes the media to ignore the VRA ruling being replicated in how the DOMA ruling is heralded while things that would more likely benefit gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people of color get ignored.
(Feel free to call me out if this is a messed up derail. I was hoping to tie in the gutting of the VRA to the racism I’ve witnessed during my years in the LGBTQ community. But I could see how my post could be seen as distracting from the VRA. Let me know if that’s what I’m doing.)
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@ Richard_III
I noticed that too. Although the Huffington Post had a fair amount of coverage on the VRA ruling, when the DOMA ruling came down they had “EQUALITY!” in big letters – apparently not seeing the irony.
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rofl. they say we out voted whites,to get obama elected and now they mad and want us to have less votes. I tell ya when we start beating them at something they always gotta change the rules. It must be sad to be beat at ur own game with rules that were created by you for you.
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@ like Uncle Tommy sellout Clarence Thomas.
Considering he grew up in southern Georgia and bore witness to the atrocities under apartheid and Jim Crow, it’s amazing that he could possibly take the action he did.
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@ jefe
I was not shocked by either – they were both long in coming. If it was not this year, it would have been in the next five years or so.
Scalia this past February on the VRA:
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If congress was so gung-ho to pass it in 2006 based on old data, why would they have problem passing it based on new info, especially if we are supposed to be in some post-racial society.
Updating the VRA based on new info would ensure it is the most effective for combating voter disenfranchisement of today.
A big problem I see with black people today is that instead of fighting the battles of today we’d rather defend the ones of the 1960s.
Why subject only a few states to Federal approval? Racism isn’t confined to those states. All states should have to get Federal approval.
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A longer version of the Scalia quote from February 2013, wherein he calls the VRA a “racial entitlement”:
Source:
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/02/27/1646891/scalia-voting-rights-act-is-perpetuation-of-racial-entitlement/
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rews77, I know right, that is what so compelling to me. He lived through the Jim Crow era and de facto an de jure segregation years yet he still voted down the bill that gave him the ability to vote? Uncle Tommy sellout Clarence Thomas really disappointed his ancestors when he planned on striking down the Voting Rights Act of 1965. What a sellout he is!
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I feel like this is a power grab, pure and simple with the help of activist right wing justices. We all need to be concerned. In the meantime, the remaining leaders of the civil rights struggle need to put together efforts to get poor and minority folks the IDs they need ASAP.
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Check out the “test” that was given to Black folks in Louisiana. After all was said and done, the registrar got to decide if an answer was correct.
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Why don’t all of the states just get their laws approved by the federal government?
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Seems to me that the federal government can still use “pre-clearance” for laws that affect voting rights. It just has to do that for all venues, not just a select subset of counties and states.
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@Poetess, this is definitely a power grab. This is more about
influencingstealing the 2014 Congressional elections, than anything. This is about ensuring that white folks ALWAYS skew the balance of power in their direction, despite how outnumbered they may be. It’s no coincidence that talk of immigration reform and the dismantling of the VRA are happening at the same time.LikeLike
[…] The VRA was indeed there to help Black people gain equal access to the ballot, but as you should well know, any time rights are stripped away from one person, they can be stripped away from YOU. […]
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Sections 4 and 5 only affected 9 states. Now all 50 states are uniform. Voter suppression is still illegal and everyone is wringing their hands like the Supreme Court retroactively surrendered to the Confederacy circa 1865. Besides, Kenyatta Johnson committed voter fraud in 2011 in South Philadelphia and Eric Holder was nowhere to be found.
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Enough….I’ve had it, I’ve made up my mind, people.
Being that life for black people are going to get worse in America, like others have pointed out, I’ve decided to live a new life, under the sea….
Look at the clip below, homer Simpsons had the right idea!
(http://youtu.be/tOXBCLtj_OQ)
Anyone want to come with me to live under the sea?
*sings, No more racial frustrations…… just tasty crustaceans, under the seaaaaaaaaaa!!! @ : o l ) >
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We need a post now on the concept of “racial entitlement”. Scalia uses that a lot.
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@Sondis
Brotha, I agree with you. Me and Peanut predicted that life will get worse for Blacks in AmeriKKKlan after President Obama leaves office in 2017. The Whites in power will make sure our lives were just as bad under Jim Crow once Obama is out of office. I do plan on getting my passport together and moving to a country where there is less racism, less violence and the people have good morals and focus on education.
I am sick of the racism, high unemployment and wickedness of this country. .
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Adeen:
So will you come live with me, under the sea? @ : o O ) >
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@Sondis
LOL I will lol. This country can really keep our people down all the time with the stereotyping and racism we face.
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Adeen:
LMFAO! I try to have fun and joke around, every now and again. I won’t give white racists the benefit of turning me into a mean person.
I have a sense of humor by nature, it comes out all the time, when I’m not being serious.
Its healthy to laugh as often as you can, Adeen. I don’t have racism on my mind, all day everyday, i keep a positive attitude for the most part.
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@ sondis
Rofl u know i always wanted to live undersea every since i saw the little mermaid. Maybe me and ursula can chill together, hmm or maybe we can go take over ariels fathers kingdom he should be dead by now. i always wanted to sit on the throne and use the trident.lol
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mstoogood4yall:
LMFAO! Yeah, i don’t want to be above ground, when everything goes down.
So yeah, living under the sea is a great idea, although we might have to tackle the obstacle of breathing under water. @ : o l ) >
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@Sondis
I wish I had a sense of humor like you have but it is hard for me because many people easily annoy me. The guy in class wondered why I get aggravated so easily since I find him so annoying. If only I had a sense of humor. Maybe I could see life through different lens.
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Adeen:
I think it has to do more with you, being young. Teenagers are very moody with their hormones raging in all. ^_^
I think you’ll change as you get older.
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Sondis
I hope. I hate high school. Hate the kids. Hate the environment and teachers. I can’t wait until it is over! Thank God, I will be a senior in the fall. I know I shouldn’t let racism get me down at all. Middle school was even worse. I hope I get through this time with a sane mind!
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Reblogged this on Mothers Against Mass Incarceration .
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So did all those people who died during the Civil Rights movement die in vain? When the Jim Crow laws were prohibiting Blacks from voting with poll taxes and literacy test and all other evil practices to keep black people down. The one lone African American that sits among the other Supreme Court justices is doing nothing. This is so shameful. Clarence Thomas should be ashamed of himself. This is a sad day in America.
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I feel like America is in retrograde. Today it’s the voting rights of Black Americans next God only knows how the system will come after us.
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Clarence Thomas succeeded Thurgood Marshall, but he is no Thurgood Marshall.
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This short YT interview by Real News with the managing editor of the Black Agenda Report, Bruce Dixon, is interesting if anyone would care to take a listen. It’s entitled, ” Does the Black Political Class Bear Some Responsibility for SCOTUS Voting Rights Act Decision?”
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Meanwhile:
Rev. Al Sharpton Vows To Keep Fighting For Voting Rights
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jefe: Your comments on Clarence Thomas succeeding Thurgood Marshall inspired me to look up the difference between these two court justices. I learned both men had different judicial ethics. Thanx for your comments always enjoy them.
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and then there’s this Voting Rights Rally held by the Nation in Birmingham Alabama on July 14 2013:
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“Turn Our Outrage Into Action:’ Judith Browne Dianis Discusses Supreme Court Voting Rights Ruling”
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For those who didn’t get a chance to watch: “Black Caucus speaks on Supreme Court ruling on the Voting Rights Acts 2013″…….sorry for vid quality.
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Thanks Goldfire!
I watched the Roland martin podcast with Tom joiner as i am subscribed to Roland martin’s YouTube channel.
Thanks for the other posts…
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We need a post on the CBC. Do they do anything? What have they accomplished as a group?
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@Solesearch: What is CBC? I googled it couldn’t find anything that had reference to this topic. Do you mean NAACP? Who is the CBC?
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Mary, the Congressional Black Caucus.
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Solesearch: sorry about that congressional black caucus. Yeah. You are right. Sorry about that sister. We do need a post on that. My bad. LOL.
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@ Solesearch : I wonder about the NAACP and now that you mention it the Congressional Black Caucus. Especially since the voting rights act is being threatened.
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You’re most welcome Sondis, 🙂 I’m afraid it’s the best I could do considering the slim Pickens out there since the SCOTUS’s unfortunate decision. It seems ta bit to quiet out there for my taste to tell you frankly. I was hoping to find vid after vid on YT of angry POC lamenting the gutting of the VRA and calling others to action, leave aside black leadership. It’s been rather disappointing, at least virtually speaking, on all fronts honestly, but can only hope that the near catatonic response from POC I have seen thus far, is a result of the shock and awe felt throughout the nation. I do hope others will share their POV, experiences, and information as it’s forth coming regarding this issue so as to at least be able to say we lent a free hand to one another prior to having to lend the field hand the SCOTUS would clearly have us left to lend had they more of their way.
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as an aside,
Yawl better get your negro spirituals together. 🙂
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GoldFire:
*sings…..The upper roommmmmmm….
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I thought you guys things will get worse for Blacks in America but none of you guys would listen to me. I am not shocked at the decision of VRA because these GOP senators want to bring back Jim Crow and segregation. They are dangerous, I tell you!
Now GOP senators and elected officials in the South could suppress the minority vote.
I will get my passport together between the time I graduate from high school and the time I graduate from college. This country doesn’t care about Black people and never will.
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“The Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA) is one of the main American civil rights reforms of the 1960s. It outlawed the literacy tests, poll taxes and other devices that the Jim Crow South used to greatly limit the black vote. It is what Medgar Evers, Freedom Summer, Selma and those fire hoses were mainly about – the right to vote.”
– Many “Manosphere” writers say that American women should not be allowed to vote because they vote for the wrong stuff.
One Manosphere orbiter and member of the “ladies auxillery” said she thought only American PROPERTY OWNERS should be allowed to vote.
Note: She’s a Black Christian woman who goes by the moniker “Alte” and has a blog of her own.
She stated on the about page of one of her blogs that there is a hierarchy of respect that must be honored. Female commenters are to defer to and respect male commenters. Male commenters could use their discretion.
Her and a number of other ladies, a few of them Black, used to sniff around Manosphere blogs crying NAWALT (not all women are like that) and trying to entice these misogynistic men with food porn (Menu Plan Mondays) and talks of “home schooling” and “homesteading”.
May I ask how the hell you can “home school” and “homestead” when you are searching for mens blogs and commenting on them all day (til your husband gets home from work, at least)?
Anyway, one by one over, each of these ladies left the Manosphere with their tails between their legs when it started to rear its sexist and racist head.
All that “respect” and “difference” just got vomitted right back at them.
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I don’t vote and don’t follow politics. Could someone tell me what is a “voter ID”?
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@Why
No offense but women’s rights aren’t exactly the same topic as Black people’s rights on whole. Yes women and Black people have been disenfranchised in the past but we are talking about Black people’s voting rights here. White women will always have more privileges than Black people in this country because of her White skin.
A voter ID is an identification that you carry to vote in elections.
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@ Why
Voter ID laws require that you show ID to vote. Supporters say it is necessary to fight voter fraud – even though cases of in-person voter fraud are extremely rare.
The beauty of voter ID from the Republican point of view is that they can pick which IDs count. So they allow, say, IDs for drivers, soldiers and gun owners, who lean Republican, but not students, who lean Democratic. The people most likely to lack ID are the poor – because many do not drive. They lean Democratic. Further, the law can be applied unfairly, like by asking registered Democrats for ID but not registered Republicans. It is a way to skew the demographics in a Republican direction.
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@Abagond
That is the point! Republican senators want to suppress the votes of minorities so that they can win elections in the South. That is the whole point of the voter IDs. These GOP senators are slick, I tell you!
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@ Adeen
Yup. Republicans are a dying demographic, so that have to resort to tricks like voter ID or this ruling on the VRA.
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@Abagond
Exactly. You are correct on that. They are dangerous, I tell you. Very dangerous. They want to suppress minority votes so that they can win elections easily.
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How about Social Security cards? Do they count as valid voter ID?
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@Why
No, Social Security doesn’t count, I don’t think. You don’t have to worry about this because you are a White woman. Whites are considered privileged in AmeriKKKlan.
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Everyone should have the same voter ID card.
Where I live now (outside USA) every eligible voter uses exactly the same Voter ID card and there are no exceptions.
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Excellent, informative read if anyone’s got the time;
“Tell the Roberts’ Court Five—the civil rights movement is still alive”
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/06/30/1219680/-Tell-the-Robert-s-Court-
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“Congressman Cleaver Speaks on the Voting Rights Act”
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“Texas Wastes No Time Screwing Minority Voters After SCOTUS Ruling”
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^^ Yup
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I don’t want to copy things from slate here, but I just saw a sample literacy test from Louisiana from the 1960s,
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_vault/2013/06/28/voting_rights_and_the_supreme_court_the_impossible_literacy_test_louisiana.html
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^ Powerful talk by Congressman Cleaver.
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Jefe but the GOP is having minorities use ID cards as a way to suppress minority votes and I do agree everyone should have an ID card.
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Goldfire, thanks for all the links. I’m optimistic that this move will backfire on the GOP by galvanizing the groups they seek to suppress.
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@Adeen
It is because the GOP is specifying which ID cards are acceptable (eg, expired gun registration licenses issued by other states) and which are not (eg, Social Security ID card with Univ. or work photo ID) with obvious express intent to disenfranchise.
There has been great opposition from many quarters in the US re: having national ID cards, but if everyone’s Soc Sec card was a picture ID, I really think we would not have this voter fraud problem. I suspect that more opposition for National ID cards comes from the white people who want to disenfranchise. National ID cards would remove this power.
The Soc Sec office would have to keep track which people are a citizen in order to issue correct ID cards, but I really think that non-white Americans should actually consider pushing for National ID cards issued by the govt.
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@Jefe
Thanks for the information but I don’t really trust the GOP.at all. They would do anything to hurt minorities and stay revelant. The Democratic Party isn’t any better either.
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This issue has already blipped off the mainstream media radar. What to do?
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@ Jefe
This August will be the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington…
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just caught up on my colbert from last week. He had a lot of coverage on it.
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Oh YES!
The original one was the 100th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation.
Now we have the 150th anniversary of that and 50th anniversary of the March on Washington. The last one dealt very directly with voting disenfranchisement. This SCOTUS ruling came right on schedule.
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@solesearch
Colbert’s analogy is spot on.
Today the USA generally does not have children doing hard dangerous work in factories. Labour protection laws have essentially wiped it out. However, just because “things have changed dramatically” does not mean that we no longer need those laws.
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some encouraging news:
“WP/ABC News Poll: majorities back gay rights decisions, disagree with voting rights decision”
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/07/03/1220880/-WP-Poll-majorities-back-g
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“No, Social Security doesn’t count, I don’t think. You don’t have to worry about this because you are a White woman.”
LOL! I don’t have to “worry” about it because I don’t vote!
But if I did vote, I’d have to worry, white or not, if I didn’t have the right ID.
So what do they want? A picture ID?
How have people been voting all these years up until now that its been made an issue?
What IDs were acceptable 20 years ago that are no longer acceptable?
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[…] Voting Rights Act of 1965 […]
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Just a few weeks left until the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington.
Hope they address this issue.
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August 28 is coming. What will be the agenda for the 50th anniversary?
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The Voting RIghts Act turns 50 years old today.
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Reblogged this on Project ENGAGE.
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