“Supreme Conflicts”: The Peaks And Valleys That Illustrate Our Country’s Worse Divisions
Like most families, my brood is a complex configuration of souls, so I greeted this week’s flurry of Supreme Court decisions with a conflicted heart.
This is true for most anyone who paid attention to the court rulings, I imagine. This latest round reflects parts of our culture we either want to embrace or want to reject. No middle ground here. It’s all peaks and valleys, the perfect graphic to illustrate our country’s divisions these days.
Initially, I was overjoyed to hear that the court had struck down the federal Defense of Marriage Act — a ridiculously named law that did nothing but harm to innocent people and their families for 17 years. Finally, the U.S. government must recognize the legal marriages of same-sex couples, and the earth didn’t tremble, not even a little bit.
Immediately, my mind was flooded with the faces of so many gay men and women who populate our daily lives — good people, crazy loyal and with a patience no one has the right to ask of them.
My mood was quickly tempered by the wake-up jolt of reality. Thirty-nine states still treat their gay citizens like modern-day lepers, passing bills and referenda as redundant as they are hateful. The DOMA decision does nothing to stop states from continuing to discriminate against men and women whose only crime is to be different from the people who fear them for reasons they can’t explain, even to themselves.
A lot of people who oppose marriage equality like to blame God for their bigotry. In my version of heaven, I get to watch them try to explain themselves.
Meanwhile, down here on earth, every time I hear someone talk about how God hates homosexuality — that whole “love the sinner, hate the sin” malarkey — I think of my late mother, whose faith survived countless trials in her 62 years.
“Being a Christian means fixing yourself and helping others,” she used to say, “not the other way around.” That’s a lifetime of work summed up right there.
Nine years ago, my husband and I were married by a minister who still cannot wed her longtime partner simply because they live in Ohio instead of Massachusetts, say, or any other state in New England where same-sex marriage is legal.
To this day, friends and family who attended our wedding want to talk about how moved they were by Pastor Kate’s sermon at our service. To this minute, Pastor Kate cannot legally claim Jackie — beloved to all of us — as her spouse, even as she works for the United Church of Christ every single day.
God’s will, you understand.
Uh-huh.
Also this week, the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act by ruling that Section 4 of the 1965 law is now unconstitutional. This particular section provides a formula to determine which jurisdictions are subject to federal government clearance before they can change their voting laws.
Historically, the voters targeted by these attempts to reduce their numbers are people of color. Also historically, Republicans are behind these changes, but they pinky-swear that it has nothing to do with how few people of color vote for them.
I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve written about these Republican stunts to suppress the vote. I can’t think of anything more patriotic than helping every eligible voter cast a ballot.
As I age, however, and our children grow up and marry, my patriotic fervor has become to-the-bone personal.
Our 5-year-old grandson bears his mother’s family name, which is Puerto Rican. Our future son-in-law emigrated with his family from El Salvador when he was a child. Republicans are not, shall we say, big fans.
As Columbia University professor Rodolfo O. de la Garza explained in an op-ed in February for The New York Times, America’s Latinos are increasingly the new Republican target for all things sinister.
“The nation does not acknowledge the discrimination Latinos have undergone,” he wrote. “Today, many public officials from states across the nation seem to feel free to treat Latinos as unwelcome newcomers and view Latino voters with suspicion. Republicans are especially leery of Latino voters who are perceived to be noncitizens or, even worse, Democrats.
“Without the law’s threat of federal intervention, I fear that the promise of Latino political equality will stagnate.”
That’s my family he’s talking about.
Fortunately, by 2043, that will be most American families in this country, as the U.S. Census Bureau estimates that that’s the year the white majority will be history.
This white granny’s going to eat a really healthful diet between now and then, because I want to live to see that day.
By: Connie Schultz, The National Memo, June 27, 2013
“A Conservative Dream Comes True”: The Supreme Court Dismisses History And The Lessons Of “Bloody Sunday”
In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court has thrown out Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, the historic law first passed in the days after 1965′s Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama.
The ruling voids the formula to determine which jurisdictions require “pre-clearance” from the federal government before they make any changes to their voting laws, effectively freeing officials to alter voting procedures at will until Congress authorizes a new formula.
The Voting Rights Act has been renewed by Congress several times. The last was in 2006, when a Republican House voted 390-33 and a Republican Senate voted 98-0 to send a renewal that authorized the law for 25 years to President George W. Bush for his signature. Despite Congress deciding that the Section 4 formula was still relevant seven years ago, conservatives on the Court disagreed.
“In assessing the ‘current need’ for a pre-clearance system treating States differently from one another today, history since 1965 cannot be ignored,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in his majority decision for Shelby County v. Holder. After suggesting that the current formula is based on “40-year-old data,” he included a chart that demonstrated the success of the law when it comes to increasing registration among African-Americans.
However, just last year, courts based several decisions to block laws designed to suppress the minority vote in the 2012 general election on Section 5, which now holds no significance without Section 4. Despite the court’s intervention, voters in Florida had to wait as many as nine hours in line to vote.
Roberts wrote that Congress “may draft another formula based on current conditions,” which is highly unlikely given current partisan gridlock.
The Nation’s Ari Berman explains that the existing formula is extremely effective in determining jurisdictions that should require “pre-clearance”:
Six of the nine states fully covered by Section 5, all in the South, passed new voting restrictions after the 2010 election. “Section 5,” write law professors Christopher Elmendorf and Douglas Spencer, “is remarkably well tailored to the geography of anti-black prejudice.” Of the ten states where anti-black stereotypes are most common, based on data from the National Annenberg Election Survey, six in the South are subject to Section 5. Racially polarized voting and “explicit anti-black attitudes,” according to an AP survey, have increased since 2008. Arkansas and Virginia have passed strict new voter-ID laws this year, while North Carolina is considering a slew of draconian restrictions.
The states of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia are all covered under the current formula. It also covers some counties in California, Florida, New York, North Carolina and South Dakota, and local jurisdictions in Michigan, all areas that have demonstrated historic discrimination against African-Americans, American Indians, Asian-Americans, Alaska Natives or Latinos.
The case brought by Shelby County was backed by “leading operatives and funders in the conservative movement along with Republican attorneys general in Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, South Dakota and Texas.”
“Overturning Section 5 is in many respects the most important battle in the GOP’s war on voting,” according to Berman.
Think Progress‘ Josh Israel and Aviva Shen predict that the immediate impact of the demise of Section 4 will lead to stricter voter ID laws, racially gerrymandered legislative maps and blocking of grassroots get-out-the-vote efforts.
“All told, between 1982 and 2006, DOJ objections blocked over 700 voting changes based on a determination that the changes were discriminatory,” Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote in her passionate dissent that explicated several instances where “pre-clearance” had prevented discriminatory laws from taking effect.
“That determination of the body empowered to enforce the Civil War Amendments ‘by appropriate legislation’ merits this Court’s utmost respect,” Ginsburg summarized. “In my judgment, the Court errs egregiously by overriding Congress’ decision.”
“I am deeply disappointed with the Supreme Court’s decision today,” President Obama said in a statement. “For nearly 50 years, the Voting Rights Act – enacted and repeatedly renewed by wide bipartisan majorities in Congress – has helped secure the right to vote for millions of Americans. Today’s decision invalidating one of its core provisions upsets decades of well-established practices that help make sure voting is fair, especially in places where voting discrimination has been historically prevalent.”
After calling the Voting Rights Act “the cornerstone of the American civil rights movement,” Vice President Joe Biden said Tuesday,”“We’re going to work with Congress in this effort and the administration is going to do everything in our power to make sure that fair and equal voting processes are maintained.”
By: Jason Sattler, The National Memo, June 24, 2013
“Congress As It Actually Is”: When The Voting-Rights Challenge Lands On Capitol Hill, A Strong GOP Incentive Not To Act At All
The Supreme Court’s ruling on the Voting Rights Act was almost clever, in an ugly and deceptive sort of way. The five-member conservative majority conceded what a great law the VRA has been, and hailed its efficacy over the years. (In a curious twist, the justices believe the law such a great success it magically became unconstitutional when we weren’t looking.)
Today’s ruling even left Section 5 of the law more or less intact, endorsing at least the concept of pre-clearance before states and municipalities can change their voting laws. So what’s the problem?
Actually, everything. While the high court’s ruling may seem fairly narrow — the majority said they simply want Congress to replace an old formula with a new one — it also probably marks the end of the Voting Rights Act. Today’s ruling calls for a fix, but as a practical matter, it guts the landmark civil-rights law.
The ruling, a 5-4 decision by Chief Justice John Roberts, leaves the future of the law deeply uncertain because it will be up to a sharply divided Congress to redraw the map, if it can agree on one at all.
“In practice, in reality, it’s probably the death knell of this provision,” said Tom Goldstein, the publisher of SCOTUSblog and a Supreme Court analyst for NBC News.
If we wore some kind of Rawlsian veil of ignorance, and forgot everything we know about the contemporary U.S. Congress, this wouldn’t necessarily have to be considered a complete disaster. Given widespread voting problems, a competent and capable legislative branch of government might even see the ruling as an opportunity to pursue meaningful election reforms.
But if we drop the veil, we see Congress as it actually is — an institution where procedural abuses are the norm, an extremist caucus holds control of the lower chamber, the politics of extortion and hostage strategies is routine, and lawmakers struggle badly to complete even rudimentary tasks.
And it’s not just about Congress’ dysfunction. As recently as 2006, the Voting Rights Act was easily reauthorized by large bipartisan majorities, and signed into law by a Republican president. But by any fair measure, the radicalization of Republican politics has intensified greatly over the last seven years.
Indeed, I imagine GOP lawmakers will see a strong incentive not to act at all on this issue — with the 2014 midterms coming up, and Republicans in the majority in so many state legislatures (especially in the South), the party will likely be content to reject all pre-clearance measures and encourage red-state lawmakers to enact sweeping new voting restrictions without fear of Justice Department oversight. In the process, Democratic hopes for electoral gains next November will be further undermined by institutional, not political, barriers.
The war on voting, in other words, is just getting started, and is poised to claim more casualties.
There is one more angle to keep in mind, though. You’ll recall that the Republican National Committee has said it’s sincere about outreach to minority communities and expanding its base beyond the GOP’s overwhelmingly white, older supporters.
If Republican lawmakers refuse to work constructively on the Voting Rights Act, and perhaps even kill immigration reform, the setback for the party’s alleged outreach efforts will be immeasurable.
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, June 25, 2013
“The Texas Rebellion”: Wendy Davis Gives New Hope To The Future For American Women
A rowdy crowd of women making demands as loudly as they can—and winning? That sort of thing doesn’t happen in Texas. Except that now, apparently, it does.
Beginning on Tuesday morning and stretching into the wee hours of Wednesday, Democrat Wendy Davis, a state senator from Fort Worth, became a national pro-choice hero as thousands of Texans flooded the state capitol to cheer her effort to stop a draconian anti-abortion bill. Governor Rick Perry had added abortion restrictions to the agenda halfway through a special session of the legislature originally intended to pass new redistricting maps. Before the session ended at midnight on Tuesday, Republican lawmakers hoped to rush through what would have been one of the nation’s most extreme anti-abortion laws. For 11 hours, Davis filibustered a bill that would have banned abortions after 20 weeks and shut down all but five of the state’s abortion clinics.
It was high drama: If Davis could hold out till midnight, she’d block the bill. It wouldn’t be easy. Under Texas’s strict filibuster rules, the senator could not eat, drink, use the bathroom, or even lean on the lectern. She couldn’t simply read from the phone book, either; she had to talk about the abortion bill or, after three warnings, the majority Republicans could force her to sit down. As the hours went by, Davis’s following grew. Nearly 180,000 followed the livestream from the Senate floor. The news spread on Twitter, where the state senator went from around 1,200 followers to over 67,000. Celebrities like Lena Dunham and Julianne Moore tweeted out support. So did President Obama, who wrote: “Something special is happening in Austin tonight,” with the hashtag “StandWithWendy.” The hashtag trended worldwide for hours.
But in the end it was the hundreds of pro-choice activists in the gallery who killed the bill in one of the most dramatic moments in Texas political memory. While Davis became the face of the effort, she was also just one part of a movement that organized swiftly and effectively. It was a feat of organization, and a show of progressive energy, that will provide a shot of energy for Democrats’ to turn the state blue.
The showdown began on Thursday with an unexpected turnout from pro-choice activists. When the House State Affairs Committee considered the anti-abortion measure, 600 activists flooded the hearing, conducting what they called a “citizen’s filibuster.” According to one lawmaker, 92 percent of those who came to testify opposed the bill. One after another, pro-choice Texans told their stories as hours ticked by. Around 4 a.m. on Friday, the Republican committee chair finally cut off testimony, calling the statements “repetitive.” The committee passed the bill quietly the next day and the House recessed until Sunday, when House Republicans planned to use technical maneuvers to fast-track the measure.
On Sunday, pro-choice activists again packed the gallery, far outnumbering the opposition. Progressives from across the country began sending food and coffee to show support. House Democrats managed to use amendments and points of order to delay the bill for more than a day, buying enough time to make a Senate filibuster possible. By the time the House finally passed the measure, it couldn’t be heard in the Senate until Tuesday. The filibuster was on.
Davis was the obvious choice to lead the filibuster. Since first being elected in 2008, when she unseated a powerful Republican lawmaker, Davis has stood out as a progressive firebrand unafraid of antagonizing her Republican colleagues. Her biography alone is impressive; a former teen mom living in a trailer, Davis put herself through both college and law school, where she graduated valedictorian. She’s unabashed in talking about her experiences with poverty and her reliance on Planned Parenthood for health care; during the filibuster, she called it “her medical home.” Davis had ended the regular legislative session in 2011 with a filibuster of $5.4 billion in cuts to public schools. That one only took an hour and a half, however, and was largely for show; the legislature came back in a special session and cut the money. But it earned Davis, who’s seen as a future statewide candidate, icon status among Texas’s long-put-upon progressives.
By the time Davis’s filibuster began on Tuesday morning, it wasn’t just the Senate gallery that was packed. Throughout the capitol and spilling outside, people wore burnt orange T-shirts, the color associated with the Texas cause (and not coincidentally, with the University of Texas). Many read, “Stand with Texas Women.” Davis read testimony from women who weren’t allowed to testify at Thursday’s committee hearing. She took questions defending her position. She spoke deliberately, was careful to avoid leaning on the podium, and occasionally paced slowly around her desk as she spoke.
As the hours ticked by, Republican senators watched like hawks for Davis to slip up. At the six-hour mark, Davis got her first warning for talking about funding for Planned Parenthood and women’s health programs—which, according to the chair, were not germane to a bill on abortion restrictions. She got another when a colleague helped her put on a back brace. The gallery was beginning to get restless when all hell broke loose around 10 p.m. With just two hours to go, Davis received her third warning—this time for mentioning a pre-abortion sonogram requirement the chamber passed last session. Her Democratic colleagues began trying to stall, raising parliamentary inquiries and appeals. Republicans scrambled to end the filibuster and take a vote before the clock hit midnight and the special session was over.
With 15 minutes to go, it looked like the Senate Democrats couldn’t hold out. Republicans were trying to vote as Democrats attempted to concoct more procedural delays. The spectators were subdued and anxious. Then things went crazy. First, the chair refused to recognize a motion to adjourn from Senator Leticia van de Putte, a Democrat who had just arrived from her father’s funeral. Van de Putte tried to make another motion, but the chair once again did not recognize her. Finally, exasperated, she called out: “At what point must a female senator raise her hand or her voice to be heard over the male colleagues in the room?
That did it. The spectators began to cheer, overwhelming the attempts of the chair to quiet them down. For a full quarter of an hour, they shouted and screamed with unceasing volume, as Republicans tried to get a vote on the bill. After midnight came and went, the Senate Republicans argued that they did take a vote and had prevailed. But the record showed otherwise; screenshots captured the Texas Legislative website showing the vote had been taken on June 26, after midnight.
Senators convened a closed-door caucus meeting to try and sort out what had actually happened. The gallery was cleared in the Senate chamber, but nobody left. People in burnt-orange T-shirts were everywhere—in the capitol rotunda, outside the building, in the hallways. It wasn’t until after 2 a.m. that word broke: The session was over, the bill was dead, and pro-choice Texans had won.
It was the kind of landmark victory that Texas progressives haven’t seen in years—a couple of decades, really. Not surprisingly, conservatives didn’t mince words about the proceedings. Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst, who’s been blamed by Republicans for the madness in his chamber, complained that the activists were “an unruly mob.” State Representative Bill Zedler tweeted, “We had terrorist [sic] in the Texas State Senate opposing [the bill].”
But these activists weren’t terrorists. They were the Texans that national observers rarely see—and they are helping to plant the seeds of a progressive revival in the state. As I watched people happily file out of the capitol in the early morning hours, it was striking to see the vast array of ages and races. Young hipsters and older soccer moms all seemed united. Most of those who have talked about a potential sea change in Texas politics have focused on Latino mobilization. (I just wrote a feature on the subject.) But Texas women have also been under-organized (and less Democratic than in other states), and they are another key to any potential progressive movement in the state. And while Davis was the face of the effort, it was pro-choice women’s spontaneous burst of engagement that shook up Texas politics this week.
By: Abby Rapoport, The American Prospect, June 26, 2013
“And So It Begins”: Republicans Plod Full Steam Ahead To Implement Voter Suppression Plans
In the wake of this morning’s Supreme Court ruling on the Voting Rights Act, it stood to reason that Republican policymakers, especially in the South, would be pleased. After all, despite generations of institutional racism and systemic discrimination, these officials have wanted to curtail voting rights without the Justice Department’s interference for a while.
But exactly how long did it take before we learned of GOP policymakers acting on that satisfaction? About an hour after the ruling was announced.
Just hours after the Supreme Court handed down a ruling that guts parts of the Voting Rights Act, Texas is moving forward with a controversial voter ID law that state Attorney General Greg Abbott hopes to implement right away.
“With today’s decision, the state’s voter ID law will take effect immediately,” Abbott said in a statement to the Dallas Morning News. “Redistricting maps passed by the Legislature may also take effect without approval from the federal government.”
The Texas law requires voters to show photo identification to vote — a measure that was blocked by the Justice Department, arguing the law could discriminate against racial minorities. At the time, Attorney General Eric Holder called the law a “poll tax.”
Holder was right, but according to the Supreme Court majority, that no longer matters.
What’s more, it’s not just Texas. My Maddow Show colleague Tricia McKinney found all kinds of related examples, with officials who seemed almost giddy by the prospect of acting on voting rights without fear of Justice Department intervention.
There was this AP story out of Mississippi …
Mississippi Republican officials are applauding Tuesday’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling that will allow the state’s voter identification law to take effect without federal approval.
… and this one out of North Carolina* …
Voter identification legislation in North Carolina will pick up steam again now that the U.S. Supreme Court has struck down part of the Voting Rights Act, a key General Assembly leader said Tuesday.
… and this one out of South Carolina …
S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson said the Supreme Court ruling is a victory over “an extraordinary intrusion into state sovereignty in certain states, including South Carolina.” He said great strides had been made over time, making the preclearance requirement obsolete.
“Today’s decision means the voting rights of all citizens will continue to be protected under the Voting Rights Act without requiring a different formula for states wishing to implement reasonable election reforms, such as voter ID laws similar to South Carolina’s,” Wilson said. “This is a victory for all voters as all states can now act equally without some having to ask for permission or being required to jump through the extraordinary hoops demanded by federal bureaucracy.”
… and in Virginia, state Senate Majority Leader Tommy Norment (R) wants folks to know that if the commonwealth approves voting restrictions, don’t worry, you can still sue.
“Voter discrimination has no place in the Commonwealth and will not be tolerated by members of the Senate of Virginia. As every Virginia voter who believes a voting law or redistricting line to be discriminatory retains the ability to bring a court challenge, protections against voter discrimination remain intact despite the Supreme Court’s decision on the Voting Rights Act.”
The “war on voting” was relentless in 2011 and 2012, and got off to an aggressive start in 2013. In the coming months, it’s going to get much worse.
*updated
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, June 25, 2013
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