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Voting Rights Act Case Study

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The Voting Rights Act was implemented in 1965 to combat the country’s long history of voting discrimination. Section 5 created a preclearance rule for certain districts, requiring that they must seek approval from the attorney general before making any changes to their voting procedures (Oyez 2018, Shelby County). Section 4(b) creates the formula for Section 5, mapping out the districts eligible for preclearance. Under Section 4(b), any state or district that had certain voting test in place or had a turnout of less than 50% for the 1964 presidential election, would be the eligible areas required for federal review. In 2006, Congress reauthorized the Voting Rights Act, with a nearly unanimous vote from both houses, establishing an extensive congressional record proving the original …show more content…

In 2013, Shelby County v. Holder was decided. The Supreme ruled, in a five to four decision, that Section 4(b) violated that Constitution, but did not answer the question regarding the constitutionality of Section 5 (Shelby County v. Holder 2013, on 24). Chief Justice Roberts, Justice Scalia, Justice Kennedy, Justice Thomas, and Justice Alito joined the majority, while Justice Ginsburg, Justice Breyer, Justice Sotomayor, and Justice Kagan dissented (Oyez 2018, Shelby County). In the opinion, the Court held that, since voting discrimination has significantly improved, seeing as to how literacy test and other measures were eliminated nation wide and the number of African American voters drastically increased, and since there is a “tradition of equal sovereignty” to the states, Section 4(b) must be struck down (Shelby County v. Holder 2013, on 11). This means that the Court no longer feels that the formula for Section 5 is the appropriate, given that it uses an outdated method to determine

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Constitution place on state’s power to determine voter qualifications? Those limitations start with the Voting Rights Act of 1965. This act prohibits racial discrimination when voting in the local, state, and federal levels. “Section 2, which closely followed the language of the 15th amendment, applied a nationwide prohibition of the denial or abridgment of the right to vote on account of race or color” (ourdocuments.gov). Not since the reconstruction period after the civil war had there been such a “significant statutory change in the relationship between the Federal and state governments” (ourdocuments.gov).

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190 Words | 1 Pages

Brown v. Board of Education was a Supreme Court Case held in Topeka, Kansas, May 17th, 1954 declaring segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. It did end segregation in schools but problems followed shortly after including struggles with the Civil Rights laws, voting rights and bussing. The 15th amendment “grants all men the right to vote and shall not be denied on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude”. This was especially towards African American males in the South. Many Southern states tried to prevent them from voting by requiring that all male African Americans to pay a poll tax and take a literacy test which is a test of one’s ability to read and write.

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813 Words | 4 Pages

This act, passed by the 89th Congress, is considered one of the most important Civil Rights acts ever passed. This bill allowed anyone, no matter what race, to vote freely, without worrying about being accosted of claims of illiteracy, insufficient education, etc… This contributed to the controversy in Texas, because the way voting districts were drawn at the time, using Stacked Vote gerrymandering, meant that districts were often times drawn based on race. Before the act was passed; this led to the white population in the districts—Remember this was during the Civil Rights Era—often times preventing the, “Colored Population”, from voting, citing reasons such as; Lack of Knowledge, and Illiteracy. This acts passing stopped all of that. The acts passing created another problem.

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702 Words | 3 Pages

1. As many of us know, union political action takes four basic forms: (1) financial support to candidates favoring union positions, (2) volunteer work by union members in campaigns, (3) endorsement of candidates and get-out-the-vote efforts, (4) and lobbying. All of the above forms are important in our cause but what I believe I should be assigned to lead the endorsement of candidates and get-out-the-vote efforts. Unions have put in a substantially increased amount of volunteer and financial resources since 1995.

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747 Words | 3 Pages

In 2013, the Supreme Court reviewed the case, based on the question if Congress violated their Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendment rights when they reauthorized section 4(b) of the Voter’s Rights Act in

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442 Words | 2 Pages

Supreme Court, Section 4 was declared unconstitutional because the discrimination and constraints in voting rights is not the same today that it was fifty years ago. This case represents an argument in favor of the Elections Clause to become the standard for voting rights as it gives legislative authority of this nature to Congress. Through this Clause, there is also an argument in favor of national proportional voting to fight the continued issue of gerrymandering. Beginning with the case of Shelby County v. Holder, the U.S. Supreme Court has the opportunity to redefine the protections and sources of authority defined under voting rights legislation under the new

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66 Words | 1 Pages

To accomplish social equality and justice has been a long controversial issue in U.S. history. Voting Rights Act of 1965 should be understood as a tremendous accomplishment today because it not only represent a symbol of the triumph of fighting social injustice, but also open the first gate for African American and minority to strive for more political power in order to create a “great society.”

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781 Words | 4 Pages

They could not agree on many aspects of the case, as two majority opinions and four minority opinions were filed. They explained that they made their decision based on the fact that the state of Florida violated the 14th Amendment by enacting a recount, the Equal Protection Clause specifically. This clause requires the federal government to respect, maintain, and uphold the legal rights of American citizens. Government cannot infringe on the civil rights of the people.

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999 Words | 4 Pages

This act closed loopholes left in the Civil Rights Act of 1960 and extended powers and more freedoms to African American people. The Act provided more power to the Civil Rights Commission allowing members of the commission to take statements and oaths from witnesses. This allowed for easier persecution, investigation, and action to be taken in matters involving the civil rights movement. The Act also reiterates that all who have been given the legal right to vote shall not be deprived of this right on the basis of colour or race. It states a person obstructing someone’s legal right to vote shall face the “constitute contempt of court”.

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563 Words | 3 Pages

The 15th Amendment (Amendment XV), which gave African-American men the right to vote, was inserted into the U.S. Constitution on March 30, 1870. Passed by Congress the year before, the amendment says, “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.” Although the amendment was passed in the late 1870s, many racist practices were used to oppose African-Americans from voting, especially in the Southern States like Georgia and Alabama. After many years of racism, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 aimed to overthrow legal barricades at the state and local levels that deny African-Americans their right to vote. In the

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1558 Words | 7 Pages

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed in order to move forward towards equality in voting in the United States. The Amendments passed in 1982 included providing aid and instruction for any voters that needed extra assistance, for example someone disabled or illiterate. It also required there to be bilingual ballots and other voting materials in jurisdictions where there were large amounts of minority populations. This allowed many Spanish-speaking citizens to vote. The Amendment also “allowed jurisdictions that could provide evidence of maintaining a clean voting rights record for at least 10 years, to avoid preclearance coverage” to change any voting laws in that state, (“Constitutional Amendments”).

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2157 Words | 9 Pages

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was an act created to conquer racial discrimination in voting. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed by the 36th President of the United States, Lyndon B. Johnson. As an American citizen, the right to vote is an example of a natural right, along with freedom of speech and freedom to exercise whatever religion one pleases, ratified by the U.S. Constitution. The United States Constitution is a document created to delegate and establish a set of rules and guidelines for the American government and people to refer to. The Constitution was signed on September 17th, 1787 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

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669 Words | 3 Pages

Finally, with the ratification the fifteenth amendment in 1870s, it secured the vote for the African Americans, and it forbid states from denying any citizens from the right to vote based on race, color, or “previous condition of servitude.” These three amendments were significant changes during the Reconstruction period because all people, not just white, can fully enjoy being an American citizen without worrying over their race or

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1821 Words | 8 Pages

Even though the government adopted the Voting Rights Act in 1965, African Americans’ suffrages were still restricted because of southern states’ obstructions. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was important for blacks to participate in political elections, but before this act was passed, there were several events led to its proposal. The government gave African Americans’ the right to vote by passing the 15th Amendment, but in the Southern States, blacks’ suffrages were limited by grandfather clauses, “poll taxes, literacy tests, and other bureaucratic restrictions” (ourdocuments.gov). As times went on, most African Americans couldn’t register their votes.

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746 Words | 3 Pages

It 's been 51 years since the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed into law, yet it seems as if voter discrimination may still be going on today. Some of the legal barriers, that it was originally meant to overcome, such as preventing African Americans from voting, have been rising in many other forms through voter identification laws. Lizette Alvarez in "G.O.P. Legislators Move to Tighten Rules on Voting", discusses some of the requirements that Republicans have tried to add to voter identification laws over many years such as photo ID’s. Kristen Clarke in "Burdening The Right To Vote: Assessing The Impact Of Mandatory Photo Identification Requirements On Minority Voting Strength", discusses how requiring photo ID’s can greatly affect African

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