I’ve seen a lot of dumb editorials in a lot of newspapers over the years – but this one in today’s Houston Chronicle has to be among the worst.

JOLTING the leadership of their own party, Texas Republicans in the U.S. House helped block a vote on renewing a key section of the Voting Rights Act. Though the White House, leaders of both parties and a Republican-led committee all supported the bill, the Texans claimed it wrongly singled out this state and was, in any case, unneeded.

The Texans were half right.

The 1965 Voting Rights Act, much of which is permanent, choked off the Jim Crow laws that kept minorities from voting.

So to clarify, the refusal to renew this “key section” of the Voting Rights Act does not eliminate the law itself, simply one section that its authors intended to end in 1970 – and which did not, in its original form, even include Texas as a state requiring preclearance. Only with the addition of non-English ballots in 1975 did the measure include Texas among the states with a preclearance requirement. Indeed, calling this a "key provision" is nonsense, given the sunset provision.

Section 5, which is up for renewal, made states with histories of voter discrimination get federal "preclearance" for any changes in their voting law. Texas is one of those states.

There was good reason to subject Texas to federal review. Civil rights lawyers would wrestle down one assault on rights — a poll tax, or a literacy rule, or a morals test — only to see Dixiecrats dream up a new one.

In other words, we are subject to this requirement because the Democrats were out to keep minorities from voting. Given that Texans have grown up politically and expelled the Democrats from most positions of governmental authority, it seems like we have made good progress to eliminating the source of the discrimination. Texas has, dare I say it, decisively moved away from its history of racial intolerance by rejecting the party of slavery segregation, and vote suppression and embraced the party of emancipation, enfranchisement, and equality.

Section 5 switched the burden of defending voter rights from civil rights workers to the federal government. Today, the rule is especially useful at the local level, where council members and others might not be sensitive to a law or procedure that would have an adverse impact on racial minorities.

Would you care to offer some examples?

When the Voting Rights Act was passed, it was easy to spot attempts to disenfranchise minority voters. Most took place in the South. In recent years, though, attacks on voter rights and access to polling places have erupted all over the map. In the last presidential election, some of the most egregious violations occurred in Florida and Ohio — states largely exempt from Section 5.

Actually, nobody had documented even a single attempt to disenfranchise minority voters in Florida, for all the heated rhetoric to the contrary. And in Ohio, black voters voted at a higher rate than white voters during the 2004 presidential election.

In an ideal world, the proposal of some Texas Republicans would indeed be law. The preclearance rule would apply to everyone. In reality, as the Texas delegation well knows, any such amendment to the Voting Rights Act would be a poison pill and prevent renewal.

States now exempt from Section 5 would furiously resist any attempt to rope them in, and administering universal application would be nearly impossible.

In other words, equal protection of the law for every citizen of every state is an unrealistic goal, and therefore it is wrong for Republicans to demand it. It is even wrong to suggest that data from the 2004 election be used to determine which states need special scrutiny – we need to continue using data almost as old as I am from the 1964 presidential election, because other states will object to changes that might subject their practices to scrutiny. Rather than attacking courageous Texas Republicans for standing on solid principle, you should be chiding those who refuse to embrace the proposed change out or political self-interest. But that would mean venturing away from the "Democrat good, Republican bad" meme that often colors the Chronicle's editorial (and nesw) pages.

The Texas lawmakers' second argument, unlike the first, is indefensible:

"I don't think we have racial bias in Texas anymore," asserts the optimistic U.S. Rep. John Carter, R-Round Rock. Really? The controversial redistricting of Texas congressional districts (deemed objectionable by the Justice Department's career lawyers) and recent attempts by the Legislature to require voter IDs suggest otherwise.

Yes, the careerists found the plan objectionable – but the courts did not. Furthermore, the major criticism of the plan has always been that its goal was partisan advantage, not racial discrimination. In fact, it created more majority-minority districts that existed under the previous plan imposed by a federal court -- so it is the Democrats that are seeking the sort of retrogression that the Voting Rights Act is meant to prevent.

If Carter and his like-minded colleagues think Texas has outgrown the need for voter protection, there's a good way to get out of Section 5 coverage. Embedded in the Voting Rights Act is a measure that lets states prove they no longer deserve preclearance. Texas has never tried to make that case.

Unfortunately, the provision asks that states prove a negative. That is, of course, impossible – rather like asking you to prove that you do not still beat your wife or abuse your children. The use of newer data (say from 2000 and 2004) rather than the 42-year–old data from the 1964 Johnson/Goldwater presidential contest would indicate where real problems with racial disparities exist today, rather than the current system which continually seeks to exorcise the ghosts of elections past. The newer data would decisively prove whether or not a problem exists.

House Republicans say they want to maximize justice in Texas. If they dropped their attack on the Voting Rights Act and worked to show Texas no longer discriminates, they would achieve their goal. Minority voters would continue to be protected by federal oversight — until the state provides the welcome proof that federal oversight is unneeded.

Dead wrong – let’s instead allow the wisdom of the law's authors to prevail and permit Section 5 to expire as they intended. Either that, or re-write it so that it covers every state, or at least the states with demonstrable current disparities. To do otherwise is foolish symbolism which fails to adequately protect the rights of any American.

Posted by: Greg at 11:31 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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