Law Commons^™

The Pursuit Of Perfection: Congressional Power To Enforce The Reconstruction Amendments, A. Christopher Bryant

Faculty Articles and Other Publications

In June 2009 the Supreme Court avoided a decision on the constitutionality of the Voting Rights Act's preclearance requirement, while at the same time managing to foreshadow that provision's ultimate demise. In a separate opinion, Justice Thomas announced that he would have reached the issue and invalidated the preclearance requirement. Conceding that unconstitutional racial discrimination in the administration of elections continued to be an unfortunate reality, he asserted that Congress was not permitted to pursue "perfect compliance" with the Constitution's mandate via the use of "broad prophylactic legislation."

Justice Thomas's statement accurately, though to be sure rather starkly, expressed an …

Outsourcing Democracy: Redefining The Public Private Partnership In Election Administration, Gilda R. Daniels

All Faculty Scholarship

“We are left with a system in which almost every state still outsources its elections to what are actually private organizations.”

Federal, state and local governments are deeply indebted to private organizations, political parties, candidates, and private individuals to assist it, inter alia, in registering voters, getting citizens to the ballot box through get out the vote campaigns (GOTV), assisting limited English proficient (LEP) citizens, and monitoring Election Day activities. In a recent Supreme Court case, Crawford v. Marion County, Justice Souter recognized that voting legislation has “two competing interests,” the fundamental right to vote and the need for governmental …

Voter Deception, Gilda R. Daniels

All Faculty Scholarship

In our recent electoral history, deceptive practices have been utilized to suppress votes in an attempt to affect election results. In most major elections, citizens endure warnings of arrest, deportation, and even violence if they attempt to vote. In many instances, these warnings are part of a larger scheme to suppress particular voters, whom I call “unwanted voters,” from exercising the franchise. Recent advancements in technology provide additional opportunities for persons to deceive voters, such as calls alerting citizens that Republicans (Whites) vote on Tuesday and Democrats vote (Blacks) on Wednesday. In spite of this resurgence of deception, the statutes …

The Voting Rights Act’S Secret Weapon: Pocket Trigger Litigation And Dynamic Preclearance, Travis Crum

Scholarship@WashULaw

Following NAMUDNO, the search is on for a way to save section 5 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA). This Note offers a solution through an examination of the VRA’s most obscure provision: section 3. Commonly called the bail-in mechanism or the pocket trigger, section 3 authorizes federal courts to place states and political subdivisions that have violated the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Amendments under preclearance. This Note makes a two-part argument. First, the pocket trigger should be used to alleviate the NAMUDNO Court’s anxiety over the coverage formula’s differential treatment of the states. The Justice Department and civil rights groups …

The Future Of Section 2 Of The Voting Rights Act In The Hands Of A Conservative Court, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Essay argues that the future of the majority-minority district is in peril, as a conservative majority on the Court stands poised to strike down section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. When the Court takes up the constitutionality of Section 2, binding precedent will play a secondary role at best. Instead, the Justices’ policy goals and ideological preferences - namely, their personal disdain for the use of race in public life - will guide the Court’s conclusion. In this vein, Justice Kennedy holds the fate of the Act in his hands. To be clear, this Essay is not trying …