Page 43 - Preclearance News Today

Because they were discriminatory. so were not talking about a 60s problem. were talking about all the way through the last election. now with this gone, it only enables people to discriminate according to the courts now. >> exactly, reverend al. you know, this is a sad day, not just for this nation, but especially for alabama. you know, the very case, the shelby case actually points to the discriminatory effects of what happened when we dont have preclearance. you know, the shelby county case wa...

Can this get done? >> well, the question is can we mobilize and build across lines for the right coalition? lets not act like in 65 they wanted to do it. the people forced it. and from a lot of mobilization, which we did last year, and a lot of colessing, we can make this happen. but lets not act as though the whole country just got up in 1965 and said lets give voting rights. lets not act like its just the south. there were places in new york that were part of this societying rights act section...

Throughout the country. and the truth sits not enough to challenge these requirements after theyre already implemented. you need preclearance to prevent them from happening in advance. >> exactly. >> thats what is going to be much, much harder to do after todays decision. >> but texas, for example, congresswoman, the federal court theres said it was discriminatory. not in 2006, last year, in the last election. and had not the justice department had this section 5, the ability to stop it with a p...

We got new reaction from a senior white house official telling nbcs peter alexander this is not a welcomed decision by any means. the official went onto say, quote, that may be gift to do given the current conditions. its great to have you here. certainly this is catching a lot of people by surprise knowing the supreme court did not strike down the preclearance, yeah, the approval requirement of this law. so explain what it did today and how it took geography into account more than americans. >>...

Argument as to whether or not it was constitutional enactment under congress powers. >> it is sometimes a fools game to try to read from arguments. susanna, what exactly it is that the justices are -- want to do. skeptical in their questioning, but do you think that is going to lead to a decision that reflects that? >> i think again, they have an opportunity to rule narrowly rather than broadly. although here its still going to have significant effect even if they rule narrowly. they might say i...

They are -- their registration for african-americans, their turnout for african-americans, is better than some states that are not covered, that is, some states that dont have to be precleared. what the court could do is essentially throw it back to congress and say, youre allowed to demand preclearance but you have to come up with a better, more rationale formula and then it will be up to congress whether congress can agree on a formula to determine which states need permission. >> well, wouldn...

Any day now, possibly tomorrow, the supreme court will hand down ruling on section 5, the clause that put extra scrutiny on states in localities with history of voter suppression or discrimination, requiring them to seek preclearance from the justice department before they can enact redistricting schemes or any changes to election process. the law covers nine states completely, almost all in the deep south, plus specific counties and cities across the country. theres already a provision in the v...

Justice department bails them out, they would no longer be covered new york longer have to submit their voting changes for preclearance. on the other hand, the groups like our non-profit group would have to do section two litigation or use other legal tools certainly not going to give up, but thats very cost prohibitive for us and for the jurisdictions and for voters. these are our most fundamental rights, certainly voters of color with concerned but all americans are concerned about this assaul...

>> the most interesting by far is the university of texass affirmative action case. affirmative action case. campuses. interesting to hear the raghts rationale for it in a country with demographics changing as quickly as ours discriminate against white candidates in interest interest of diversity. >> end point for affirmative action. >> hard to see how we havent given the changing demographics. >> chris: chuck? >> the most important case is the voting rights act. the court is going to decide whe...

Firm view and he joins as we saw in the decisions that came in those cases, with justices clarence thomas, in believing racial classifications for the most part are always wrong. even if theyre done for a good reason. >> and theyre wrong no matter what. >> yes. and i think it will be very interesting to see how this plays out. this term, the court has two cases. one involving affirmative action, the university of texas. and also, the voting rights case. >> i wanted to talk to you about exactly t...