The Supreme Court Confirms We Need to Protect Civil Rights | Opinion
Supreme Court recently ruled against Alabama Republicans, requiring the state to redraw congressional districts in support of greater representation of Black voters.
This ruling shocked civil and voting rights activists, including me, as we expected the conservative Roberts Court to further disenfranchise voters of color.If the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Alabama Republicans, they would have gutted the last protections of the Voting Rights Act (VRA), the landmark civil rights law from the 1960s.
The Roberts Court already invalidated a central part of the law in 2013, which required states with a history of discrimination to obtain "preclearance" from the federal Justice Department before making any changes in their voting laws.
If the Republicans won this most recent case, the Court would have invalidated the last remaining recourse against disenfranchisement for voters of color, which made it illegal to dilute representation of racial groups.Instead, Chief Justice Roberts joined with Justice Brett Kavanaugh and the Court's liberal members to protect the one last tool for civil rights that the VRA gave us.
