6.25.2013

Not So Fast My Friend


All the headlines are saying a "key provision" of the Voting Rights Act was killed by the Supreme Court this morning. I don't think so at all.  Stolen from the great scotusblog.com :

Today’s holding in Shelby County v. Holder, in Plain English: Today the Court issued its decision in Shelby County v. Holder, the challenge to the constitutionality of the preclearance provisions of the Voting Rights Act. That portion of the Act was designed to prevent discrimination in voting by requiring all state and local governments with a history of voting discrimination to get approval from the federal government before making any changes to their voting laws or procedures, no matter how small. In an opinion by Chief Justice John Roberts that was joined by Justices Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, and Alito, the Court did not invalidate the principle that preclearance can be required. But much more importantly, it held that Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, which sets out the formula that is used to determine which state and local governments must comply with Section 5’s preapproval requirement, is unconstitutional and can no longer be used. Thus, although Section 5 survives, it will have no actual effect unless and until Congress can enact a new statute to determine who should be covered by it. [Emphasis added.]

If they had killed the preclearance provision, we would have story. Now Congress just needs to come up with a new formula to figure out which states are racist and everything is the same as it was.

Edit: Well this is fast. And confusing.  The Obama Administration had challenged Texas Voter ID under the Voting Rights Act so that is dead for the moment. But couldn't someone challenge Texas' Voter ID law under the Supremacy Clause that just caused a similar law in Arizona to be struck down? (The Justice Department had approved Arizona's voter ID law under the Voting Rights Act.)


at 11:10 AM