The Voting Rights Act

Justice Williams also commented “The framers of the Constitution intended the states to keep for themselves, as provided in the Tenth Amendment, the power to regulate elections” Within the opinion of the Supreme Court, it was mentioned that all states should enjoy equal sovereignty, and under Section 4(b) this was not possible and it went against the sovereignty of the states. Chief Justice Roberts mentioned in his opinion “ At the sane time, voting discrimination still exists; no one doubts that. The question is whether the Act’s extraordinary measures, including its disparate treatment of the States, continue to satisfy constitutional requirements. As we put it a short time ago, the Act imposes current burdens and must be justified by current needs”

The Voting Rights act of 1965 was established on August 6, 1965. This law was set to outlaw discrimination of voting practices adopted in many Southern States after the civil war, including literary test as a prerequisite to voting. The act was signed into law by former president Lyndon Johnson after a century of deliberate and violent denial of the vote to African- Americans in the South and latinos in the Southwest as well as many years of entrenched electoral systems that shut out citizens with limited fluency in english. The voting Rights act of 1965 has traced back to the 14th and 15th Amendment where it grants citizenships to all persons born in the united states including former slaves and provided all citizens with equal protection

My research topic is the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and I chose this topic because I always found it amusing that it took so long for African Americans to legally be allowed to vote. I also thought this topic was appropriate since we now have an African American president, and the African Americans citizens need to know that voting I important because we didn’t always have that right.

The emancipation proclamation was what seemed like the beginning of freedom for African Americans. African Americans fought hard and valiantly in the American Civil war and with the Unions win freedom and peace for blacks seemed to be assured. As most people would quote," Freedom isn 't free." It almost always has a cost. Africans Americans since the origin of this country have literally laid down their lives for the cost of freedom and opportunity in the US. One of the most coveted freedom 's both past and present is the right to suffrage. My paper discusses the many factors leading to and the trials and tribulations involving black 's right to vote. In this paper, I will discuss the constitutional amendments as well as the landmark supreme court cases that affected both the lives and voting rights of African Americans during the time period of 1865 through 1900.

Throughout America’s history the franchise has been withheld from different groups. This has been possible due to weakly written laws that do not provide adequate protections. In 1965 PL 89-110 was passed, this law, commonly known as the Voting Rights Act of 1965, finally provided real protections for minorities living in southern states. In recent years the language of the law was modified within the Supreme Court to take away the law’s primary power. In the following mock Congressional testimony we will go back to 1848, 13 years before the American Civil War, and provide evidence of why a law like PL 89-110 is necessary and commendable.

Nearly 100 years after the 15th amendment was ratified, vast disparities and blatant discrimination in voting process and practice were still pervasive, particularly in certain southern states like Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. The 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA) was enacted by congress to address this enduring inequity. Section 5 of the VRA requires that states meeting criteria set out in section 4(b) of the act, must obtain federal “preclearance” before enacting any laws that affect voting. Section 4(b) provides the conditions for the preclearance requirement as state or jurisdictions where less than 50% of minorities were registered to vote in 1964.

The constitution laid the groundwork for America's citizens giving essential rights to everyone. That would have been the ideal America; Humans are flawed and there of course has to be some form of disagreement. Throughout America's existence there have been arguments, public unrest, deadly altercations and disagreements when it comes to people's rights. An instance of this can be shown through Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s campaign. He dreamed of abolishing the mentality of the south not allowing blacks to vote. Dr. King also wanted to unite people not matter their skin color. Dr. King was another activist who contributed to the Civil Rights Act being passed. Due to Dr. King's acts the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was established to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that prevented African Americans from exercising their right to vote under the 15th Amendment (1870) to the Constitution of the United States.

Following the Civil War and freeing of slaves all over America a new question arose: Should black people be able to vote? Further, were they even citizens in the fullest sense? Now freed from slavery, black Americans found themselves in a political limbo where they were no longer property but not fully citizens. In an effort to extend protection from discrimination at the poll booth, an amendment to the Constitution was passed declaring it unlawful to deny voting on account of race. This amendment, however, was met with unprecedented resistance. Suppression of the black vote was just one step in preventing black Americans from being treated as citizens.

If this course has taught us, it is the vital role and the genius of the creation of our judicial system. It has also showed us that was and is not perfect. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was good and effective legislation. Shelby County v. Holder (2013) legally justified according to the Supreme Court of the United States. But what can be frightening s the logic based on numbers. Chief Justice Roberts numerically logic defies realistic application too. Roberts writes in his opinion, “Nearly 50 years later, they are

In the concurring opinion Justice Roberts agrees that there is still voter discrimination around the country and that another law addressing current conditions could be written. In his letter to the senators Martin Luther King Jr. says that people who are not giving full rights to citizens is like stealing valuable property, “Society must protect the robbed and punish the robber”(28). The Voting Rights Act was some sort of punishment for the states that were robbing the people of their right to vote, and it was what protected these minorities from things such as literacy test and poll taxing. Without the Voting Rights Act is like letting the robber rob again, but in this case is letting the state legislators make laws that will prevent minorities in casting their vote, and eventually electing less people of color to office. This shows that the social hierarchy is still embedded in the structure of the legal system and that the dominant race will keep implementing their ideologies to keep these inequalities. Justice Roberts and the rest of the justices believe there should be an improved law to replace the Voting Rights Act, aware that the process could take years which means another imbalance between minorities and dominant races in the legal

In 2013 a court case “Shelby County, Alabama v. Holder” that challenged the constitutionality of the Voting Rights Act, the Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision ruled that Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which was an act that …..was unconstitutional because it was based off of old data and no longer applied to those certain nine states which were Alabama, Texas, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, Mississippi, Louisiana and Virginia. (Excerpt from Shelby County, Ala. V. Holder) The Supreme Court’s decision in Shelby County, Alabama v. Holder was unjust because it abolished Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act which protected minorities from voting discrimination in the South and caused a step back on the path to full equality because those nine states will go back to their ways where they discriminated and hindered African American and minorities from voting because they no longer have the authority of the Voting Rights Act over their heads.

The second act passed by the government was the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The Voting Rights Acts was passed by the Senate on May 26th, by the U.S House of Representatives on July 9th, and finally signed into law on August 6, 1965 by President Lyndon Johnson. What brought the act about was the amount of violence that had taken place in the United States over African Americans protesting for their basic rights as humans. “One event occurred on March 7, 1965, when peaceful participants in a voting rights march from Selma, Alabama, to the state capital in Montgomery were met by Alabama state troopers who attacked them with nightsticks, tear gas and whips after they refused to turn back. Some protesters were severely beaten, and others ran for

The Voting Rights Act 42 U.S.C. §§ 1973 et seq., decision is important regarding the laws governing voting rights and their relationship to minority voters. Its implication and effects however does not end within the legal realms and dimensions but continues through to society, culture, and human rights. The Voting Rights Act initially established in 1965 under Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration protected “racial minorities” from biased voting practices. It was a huge stride in the civil rights movement and a victory over harmful, archaic, and biased voting practices and traditions.

The voting rights act was basically a way to establish equality within ethnicity it was a way to stop discrimination for voters who were of different ethnicity. Act's Sections 2 and 5, arguably its most important parts. In section 2 of the voting rights act it states that no one can try to decrease minority votes by excluding them in the district grouping. Section 5 of the act puts a limit on the states that try to enforce a system that can possibly have a restriction of voting towards minority’s that way it would also prevent discrimination. In Texas it is set that all people are accounted for no matter what. As long as they live in the area they are taken account for even non- citizens are also taken account that’s what the voting rights act of 1965 led to down in Texas besides the fact that it included the ethnicity it also included

feel unworthy of voting. They thought that if the blacks felt poor, then blacks would not vote because they thought of themselves as improper. The money wasn’t all that much, it was only $1 to $2 a year. Many of the Southerners would not hire, and even if they did they would not pay enough for the blacks and a select few whites to pay the poll tax. No states punished those who did not pay the tax, but many people who had to pay the tax were afraid of what would happen if they did not pay. People also felt the need to pay them since if you did not pay you couldn't vote. In 1937 a white man went to the Supreme Court saying that the poll taxes were unconstitutional compared to the 14th and 19th amendments. Since he thought that the taxes were taking away a citizen's right to vote freely without consequence. He also thought they were opposing of sex since women who were registered to vote had to pay the tax and the women not registered did not have to pay the tax,no matter what color or class they were.The Supreme Court dismissed his claims, saying that the poll taxes were simply to collect revenue and in no way were related to disfranchisement. They also said that the 19th amendment was solely meant for voting rights and it had no relation to taxation.The case was called Breedlove v.s Suttles.