By Nick Blumberg, KJZZ News for Fronteras
PHOENIX – For the second time in as many weeks, the US Supreme Court has handed down an opinion that could have a big impact on elections in Arizona. The court’s conservative justices struck down a key part of landmark civil rights-era legislation.
The Voting Rights Act was passed in 1965 to ensure minorities weren’t kept from the polls. Section 5 of that law requires Arizona, seven other states, and dozens of counties to get Justice Department approval any time they want to change election laws or procedures — everything from redistricting to voter ID to moving a polling place. On a 5-4 vote Tuesday, the Supreme Court ruled the formula, that determines who must get so-called preclearance, is unconstitutional. The case was filed by a county in Alabama and joined by Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne.
“We had to pre-clear about 40 to 50 Arizona laws each year, and the Justice Department form is very detailed. So I had two lawyers and a paralegal in my office spend full-time on these applications during part of the year when their time could be much better spent, and now will be spent, fighting crime.”
Section 5 was initially supposed to be a temporary measure — strong medicine against rampant racial discrimination. Clint Bolick is an attorney with the Goldwater Institute. He thinks Section 5’s time has come and gone.
“It’s sort of like saying, ‘We had a fire, we brought out the fire department to put out the fire, we need to keep the hoses on the house in the fear that the fire is going to rekindle.”
And Bolick says without Section 5, it’s not as though elections will become a free-for-all.
“Nothing that was illegal yesterday is legal today. All of the substantive protections of the Voting Rights Act remain intact.”
“The current situation looks in part as it does because of Section 5.”
Justin Levitt thinks the Supreme Court got it wrong. He teaches at the Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, and says other parts of the Voting Rights Act still provide grounds to sue over voter disenfranchisement, but…
“…it’s costly, both in terms of time and resources to bring this sort of litigation. And in the meantime, you may well see laws that cut back either on minority representation or on minorities’ ability to participate.
“I see it as a victory for Arizona, I see it as a victory for the Tenth Amendment.” (0:04)
Which, if you’re a little rusty on civics, says powers not reserved for the federal government are granted to the states. Shane Krauser is an attorney with the firm Davis Miles in Tempe. He thinks preclearance is federal overreach — based on outdated information.
“If you believe that these states are engaging in discriminatory practices, that’s fine. But use contemporary data to illustrate that they are, in fact, doing that, not data from 50 years ago.”
While the Act was initially passed in the 60s, it’s been renewed several times — most recently in 2006, with near-unanimous support. Phoenix attorney Joaquin Rios says Congress could have changed the coverage formula then, but chose not to. He thinks Tuesday’s ruling is legislating from the bench.
“Here is a judiciary where judges who, in other instances, pride themselves on supposedly being literalists, taking a law that was duly passed, in effect, that passed by really remarkable margins the last time it was renewed, looking at that law, saying that it’s outdated, and changing it.”
Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts said the court does not overturn an act of Congress lightly, but that, quote, “while any racial discrimination in voting is too much, Congress must ensure that the legislation it passes to remedy that problem speaks to current conditions.” That being said, Attorney General Tom Horne doesn’t think much will happen on Capitol Hill.
“As long as Congress has a majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives, it’s pretty safe to predict that it will not be passed and preclearance is a thing of the past.”
Loading ...