In one of the best analogies ever found in a Supreme Court opinion, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg likened the Voting Rights Act’s preclearance provision to an umbrella in a rainstorm: “Throwing out preclearance when it has worked and is continuing to work…is like throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you’re not getting wet.” And like your umbrella, you don’t know how much you’ll miss it ‘til it’s gone.
A recent article in Rolling Stone surveys local, county, and statewide voting changes that have been put in place in Georgia since preclearance was gutted, allowing the state to enact voting changes without submitting them to the federal government for approval in advance. In Georgia alone, it’s a rainstorm.
The city of Athens, for example, is considering eliminating nearly half of its 24 polling places and creating two early voting centers—inside police stations! It should go without saying that police stations may not seem like the most welcoming places to racial minorities in Georgia. And wherever they put the voting centers (or “super-precincts” as they’re often called), the consolidation of polling places always disproportionately affects those without easy access to transportation, such as low-income and minority voters. Now, I wouldn’t be so bold as to predict what the Justice Department or a federal court would have to say about this proposal, but both the number and the placement of polling stations have been traditional preclearance issues because they undoubtedly can have racial repercussions.
When pushed on the polling place issue, Athens’ Supervisor of Elections explained that now that early voting has gained so much popularity, they don’t have to provide so many voting sites on Election Day, and that police stations were chosen because they are large enough to accommodate the crowds. But, early voting is supposed to offer voters additional options to exercise the franchise, not a substitute for their ability to vote on Election Day.
In Morgan County, Georgia, a proposal to eliminate over half of the polling places was opposed by a city councilman, who argued that it could disenfranchise low-income, minority voters who lack access to automobiles. Chastened, but not too much, the Board of Elections then voted to eliminate just over a third of the polling sites.
And polling place consolidation is far from the only kind of voting change brewing in the cities and counties of Georgia since the state got out from under preclearance. In the Atlanta suburb of Druid Hills, a Georgia State political science professor (who has extensive international election monitoring experience) was shocked by what he saw when he voted in a special election in August. The poll workers sported t-shirts on one side of the issue being voted on; the polling station was open for only four hours; and was located in a predominantly white neighborhood, despite the fact that school district at issue in the election was majority black.
In Augusta, local officials are reportedly reconsidering an election change rejected for preclearance by the Department of Justice just last year—to reschedule the city’s elections from November to the summer months, when the city’s black turnout is generally lower. DOJ had searched in vain for any justification for the change, but all it could find was voter suppression.
There’s one more important safeguard to voting fairness that we lost when we lost the preclearance coverage formula, and this hasn’t been talked about as much. A state, county, city, or town subject to preclearance was also required to report all impending voting changes to the Department of Justice, on the public record and accessible on a public website. No more. Now, we fear, many voting changes, particularly local ones, are and will remain under the radar. We are grateful to the press, such as Rolling Stone, and our local colleagues who bring these insidious schemes out in the open so that we can fight against them, albeit with more limited tools since the Supreme Court’s decision.
Photo by SEIU International via Creative Commons