Voting Rights Law is 50, but its future is uncertain

Fifty years ago, AmericanS were forced to face the bitter truth about this nation’s racist underpinnings when television screens were filled with images of black protesters in Selma, Ala., being charged upon by state troopers on horseback. Each thud of a nightstick on the head and body of a marcher, each crack of a bullwhip, and each crunch of a horse’s hoof on a defenseless victim served to awaken the conscience of the American people.

Before Bloody Sunday, March 7, 1965, many people around the country embraced an out-of-sight, out-of-mind attitude when it came to the mistreatment of blacks at the hands of whites, especially in the deep South.

But the charge of the Alabama state troopers on hundreds of unarmed marchers who simply wanted to exercise their right to vote – a right enshrined in the U.S. Constitution – was a shock to the senses.

That fateful day at the Edmund Pettus Bridge was the turning point of the civil rights movement led by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr..

Ultimately, King successfully organized a march of 2,000 from Selma to Montgomery, the state capital – and the rest is history.

On Aug. 6, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act and publicly admitted this bitter truth:

“Millions of Americans are denied the right to vote because of their color.”

Johnson, a Democrat, called the bipartisan Voting Rights Act “one of the most monumental laws in the entire history of American freedom.”

He was right. The last half century has seen millions of blacks, Latinos, Asian-Americans and others added to the voting rolls.

“Americans have voted an increasing number of minorities into public office and have chosen a black man for the nation’s highest elective office twice,” the Voice of America reported in a piece commemorating the 50th anniversary. “Many states have broadened access to balloting, from improving the ease of registration to expanding polling times and absentee voting.”

Growing concern

But the VOA report also focuses on the growing concern, especially among minorities and the Democratic Party, over the efforts by Republican-led states to dismantle important parts of the Voting Rights Law.

The concern is well articulated by Congressman John Lewis, D-Ga., who as a young man was beaten mercilessly during the Selma march.

“Across the country, there is a deliberate, systematic attempt to make it harder and more difficult for the disabled, students, seniors, minorities, poor and rural voters to participate in the democratic process,” Lewis told the VOA. “The burden should not be placed on citizens whose rights are violated to mount their own defense.”

This newspaper has expressed similar concerns about the actions of Republican officeholders in Columbus who seem determined to erect unfair and unnecessary barriers to voting.

We have long argued that government should encourage, rather than discourage, eligible voters from participating in the process.

The American Civil Liberties Union has issued numerous reports on the restrictions that have been, and are being, imposed. Such moves are chipping away at the very foundation of democracy.

Photo ID requirements, reductions in early voting periods and restrictions to voter registration have received the most criticism from voting rights organizations, including the League of Women Voters. Add to the mix the June 2013 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that a key provision in the Voting Rights Law is no longer necessary, and you have a poisonous brew of voter suppression.

As the Voice of America story puts it, the provision required nine states with histories of flagrant racial discrimination to get federal approval before changing election procedures. But the justices, by a 5-4 vote, found the “preclearance” formula used on these mostly Southern jurisdictions was outdated.

Thus, today, on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Voting Rights Act, the question members of Congress who are participating in the commemoration, must answer is this: What will you do to restore the law’s crucial protections and prevent states from implementing procedures that have the effect of taking this country back to the days of poll taxes and literacy tests?

Lawmakers must be held to account.