The Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2014 (H.R. 3899, S. 1945) was introduced in January as a response to the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Shelby v. Holder on June 25, 2013, invalidating one part of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Liberals are pressuring congressional leaders of both parties to enact this legislative “fix.” On June 4, more than 80 liberal religious groups sent a letter to Congress urging passage. The original law required the U.S. Justice Department or a D.C.-based federal court panel to preclear any voting-law changes in nine mostly Southern states and local jurisdictions in six others. Enacted with huge majorities in both houses of Congress, the statute eliminated Jim Crow laws that had discriminated against blacks since the days of Reconstruction after the Civil War. The law was a crucial, effective component of the civil rights campaign to end racial discrimination. In recent years, however, evidence has piled up that Section 5 is being abused by a politicized Justice Department. The Supreme Court rightly noted that Section 4, which justified and required unequal treatment of some states under Section 5, could no longer pass constitutional muster because it relied on nearly 50-year-old, obsolete data.
Posted on: Tue, 15 Jul 2014 05:26:09 +0000
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