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Mr. Beat presents...Supreme Court Briefs
Shelby County, Alabama April 2010
The county sues the United States Attorney General, who at the time was Eric Holder.
Why?
Well Shelby County said that parts of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were unconstitutional.
You know, the law that Martin Luther King, Jr. and many others fought so hard to get
passed to end voter discrmination that often targeted African Americans in the South?
Shelby County had an issue with Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which required certain
state and local governments to get clearance with the Attorney General if they wanted to
change their election laws.
Section 4b of the Voting Rights Act described a formula used to determine which governments
would be subject to that preclearance requirement in Section 5.
Shelby County was basically like, “we ain’t discriminating anymore, so why discriminate
against us?”
It argued Sections 5 and 4b of the Voting Rights Act were unconstitutional, and that
the times had changed, so they were outdated anyway.
Well, the judge, John D. Bates, sided with the Attorney General, saying that such requirements
were still needed to fight discrimination.
Oh you know that Shelby County went all up and appealed, but on May 18, 2012, the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit agreed with the lower court.
So Shelby County appealed again, this time to the Supreme Court, who agreed to hear oral
arguments on February 27, 2013.
The Court had a lot to consider for this case.
Obviously, the Voting Rights Act, but also the 14th Amendment, which protects everyone’s
right to due process under the law, the 15th Amendment, which protects everyone from having
their right to vote taken away based on “race, color, or previous condition of servitude,”
and finally the 10th Amendment, which reserves all rights not granted to the federal government
to the states.
Whew.
The big question?
Did state and local governments still have to follow Sections 5 and 4b of the Voter Rights Act?
The Court said “no,” but boy this was a close one.
On June 25, 2013, they announced they had sided with Shelby County by a vote of 5-4.
The Court argued that Section 4b of the Voting Rights Act was unconstitutional because the
coverage formula was based on information that was more than 40 years old.
The Court did NOT strike down Section 5, but without Section 4b, no jurisdiction could
be subject to a preclearance, unless Congress established a new coverage formula.
To this day, Congress has not done that by the way.
The Court added that Congress can’t subject a state to preclearance simply based on past discrimination.
Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts argued that federal protection was
no longer needed.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote a dissenting opinion acknowledging that yes, voting discrimination
had indeed decreased since the Voting Rights Act passed, but that was mostly due to the...um...the
VOTING RIGHTS ACT.
“Throwing out preclearance when it has worked and is continuing to work to stop discriminatory
changes is like throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting
wet.”
Ginsburg added that the 14th, 15th, 19th, 24th, and 26th Amendments all provided evidence
that indeed Congress could get all up in the business of state and local governments in
order to protect the vote.
Today, Shelby County v. Holder remains a controversial decision.
Critics have argued that the ruling has made it easier for state officials to make it more
difficult for people of color to vote.
One thing that is indisputable- since the ruling, several states that used to have to
get preclearance under the Voting Rights Act have passed laws that have made it more difficult
to vote, getting rid of things like early voting and same-day voter registration.
Five years after the ruling, around 1,000 polling places have been closed in the country.
Most of these closed polling places were in counties with African American majority populations.
One study also found that jurisdictions that used to have to get preclearance under the
Voting Rights Act have dramatically kicked more folks off voter registration lists.
And many of those taken off voter registration lists don’t even know they’ve been kicked off.
(cool music)
I’ll see you for the next Supreme Court case, jury!
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This case was suggested by my Patreon supporters Cal, Kate, and Marley, so a shout out to them.
Indeed, a very...timely...suggestion.
So, what say you fine citizen?
Did the Court get it right for this case?
PragerU, perhaps unsurprisingly, says that voter suppression doesn’t exist, but what do YOU think?
Let me know down below.
Thanks for watching, jury and you might just double check to make sure that you are registered to vote.