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Articles 1 - 8 of 8
Full-Text Articles in Law
Unfinished Business: Protecting Voting Rights In The Twenty-First Century, Gilda R. Daniels
Unfinished Business: Protecting Voting Rights In The Twenty-First Century, Gilda R. Daniels
All Faculty Scholarship
While minorities have experienced great progress because of the Voting Rights Act, particularly section 5 of the Act, the work to achieve an electoral process free of discrimination remains unfinished. In Shelby County v. Holder, the Supreme Court struck down section 4 of the Act, which provided the coverage formula through which section 5 was implemented. Without section 4, there is no section 5. The historical and contemporaneous discrimination that minorities in states formerly covered under section 5 continue to face is substantial and outpaces that in noncovered states. Scholars cannot divorce the debate surrounding section 5’s constitutionality, which continues …
Identification Problems And Voting Obstacles For Transgender Americans, James A. Haynes
Identification Problems And Voting Obstacles For Transgender Americans, James A. Haynes
Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality
No abstract provided.
South Carolina's 'Evolutionary Process', Ellen D. Katz
South Carolina's 'Evolutionary Process', Ellen D. Katz
Articles
When Congress first enacted the Voting Rights Act (VRA) in 1965, public officials in South Carolina led the charge to scrap the new statute. Their brief to the Supreme Court of the United States described the VRA as an “unjustified” and “arbitrary” affront to the “Equality of Statehood” principle, and a “usurp[ation]” of the State’s legislative and executive functions. Not surprisingly, the Warren Court was unpersuaded and opted instead to endorse broad congressional power to craft “inventive” remedies to address systematic racial discrimination and to “shift the advantage of time and inertia from the perpetrators of evil to its victims.” …
A Cure Worse Than The Disease?, Ellen D. Katz
A Cure Worse Than The Disease?, Ellen D. Katz
Articles
The pending challenge to section 5 of the Voting Rights Act insists the statute is no longer necessary. Should the Supreme Court agree, its ruling is likely to reflect the belief that section 5 is not only obsolete but that its requirements do more harm today than the condition it was crafted to address. In this Essay, Professor Ellen D. Katz examines why the Court might liken section 5 to a destructive treatment and why reliance on that analogy in the pending case threatens to leave the underlying condition unaddressed and Congress without the power to address it.
What Was Wrong With The Record?, Ellen D. Katz
What Was Wrong With The Record?, Ellen D. Katz
Articles
Shelby County v. Holder offers three reasons for why the record Congress amassed to support the 2006 reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) was legally insufficient to justify the statute's continued regional application: (1) the problems Congress documented in 2006 were not as severe as those that prompted it to craft the regime in 1965; (2) these problems did not lead Congress to alter the statute's pre-existing coverage formula; and (3) these problems did not exclusively involve voter registration and the casting of ballots.
Shelby County V. Holder: Why Section 2 Matters, Ellen D. Katz
Shelby County V. Holder: Why Section 2 Matters, Ellen D. Katz
Articles
Editor’s Note: Professor Ellen D. Katz writes and teaches about election law, civil rights and remedies, and equal protection. She and the Voting Rights Initiative at Michigan Law filed a brief as amicus curiae in Shelby County v. Holder, on which the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments February 27. Here, she examines why Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act bears consideration in the case, which involves a challenge to Section 5 of the act.
Blacks And Voting Rights In Nevada, Rachel J. Anderson
Blacks And Voting Rights In Nevada, Rachel J. Anderson
Scholarly Works
This article is a brief foray into black suffrage and equal rights in Nevada legal history. It is part of "A Special Series on African Americans in Nevada Politics - Past and Present" on pages 16-21 of the issue. Sources are on page 21 of the issue.
Mapping A Post-Shelby County Contingency Strategy, Guy-Uriel Charles, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer
Mapping A Post-Shelby County Contingency Strategy, Guy-Uriel Charles, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer
Faculty Scholarship
This Essay was written for the Yale Law Journal Online Symposium on the future of section 5 of the Voting Rights Act after Shelby County v. Holder. Professors Guy-Uriel E. Charles and Luis Fuentes-Rohwer argue that voting rights activists ought to be prepared for a future in which section 5 is not part of the landscape. If the Court strikes down section 5, an emerging ecosystem of private entities and organized interest groups of various stripes—what they call institutional intermediaries—may be willing and able to mimic the elements that made section 5 an effective regulatory device. As voting rights …