Shelby County, Alabama vs. Holder

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RedState:

Shelby County, Alabama vs. Holder

 

By: davenj1 (Diary) | February 10th, 2013 at 12:05 PM

At the end of this month, the Supreme Court will hold one hour of oral argument in the case known as Shelby County, Alabama vs. Holder which may render a landmark civil rights ruling. Specifically what is at stake here is the future of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, arguably one of the most important and successful laws against discrimination in voting ever enacted. Prior to its enactment (incidentally, with broad Republican support in Congress and strong Democratic opposition), the Justice Department was left with the cumbersome task of filing individual charges and trying them in court. This was not only a time-consuming task, but also costly. Thus, the Voting Rights Act was passed granting the federal government, through the Justice Department or a federal court in Washington DC, broad and sweeping powers to identify and root out discriminatory voting laws in covered jurisdictions.

 

Today, nine southern states are covered in full. This means that not only their state government, but every municipality and political subdivision within those states must receive federal approval before they change any election law. Additionally, municipalities or counties in seven other non-southern and some other southern states are covered. To fall under the law, it originally targeted the worst of the discriminatory offenders using a complicated statistical model designed to effectively target the South. Under the formula, other areas in non-southern states fell under the law’s purview. A 1972 extension of the law addressed ethnic as well as racial discrimination in voting. Thus, you find areas of California and Arizona now covered by the law (due to their Hispanic populations). Soon after its passage, the law was challenged and upheld by the Supreme Court in 1966. Also, challenges to the 1972 extension have survived Supreme Court scrutiny. The most recent extension occurred in 2006 and expires in 2032. It is this extension that finds itself before the Court today.