The Present Is a Thing of the Past

This week, the United States is marking the fiftieth anniversary of the Voting Rights Act, a major accomplishment of the Civil Rights movement. There is no real reason to celebrate. This law, signed August 6, 1965, by President Lyndon B. Johnson, outlawed discriminatory electoral practices that prevented blacks from participating in politics. The law’s opponents never ceased to find ways around it. The most remarkable example is the way in which Republicans placed George W. Bush in the White House in 2000. However, history shows that the law has had significant effects. Between 1965 and 2013, the Department of Justice and federal courts blocked over 3,000 discriminatory provisions that had been adopted across the country. On Thursday, The New York Times* revealed that in 2012, for the first time, the proportion of blacks who voted during a presidential election was higher than the proportion of whites.

In 2013, America’s racist past resurfaced in the present when a Supreme Court judgement repealed the anti-discrimination measures in the Voting Rights Act, claiming that the law’s usefulness had come to an end. What this incredible lapse in judgement actually did was set the United States back 50 years.

The federal law having lost its teeth, a dozen Republican-controlled states adopted electoral provisions that on the surface were to fight electoral fraud, a quite minor issue. It is clear they are trying to curb the voting rights of blacks — who overwhelmingly vote Democrat. This happened especially in southern states like Texas, North Carolina, Mississippi and Virginia, but not exclusively — Ohio and Wisconsin, among other states, have done the same. These governments learned to veil their intentions by implementing stricter voter identification requirements, eliminating the right to register to vote on Election Day, and reducing advanced polling times — all measures that disproportionately affect voting-age blacks. Under these conditions, what anomalies will we see during the 2016 election?

These backward measures stand in stark contrast to the more reformist attitude shared by Americans. A multitude of studies and polls demonstrate that last year’s Ferguson riots, the many subsequent police brutality scandals, and June’s Charleston massacre have all made people aware of the injustice the black community still faces. This change of attitudes is uncertain; it still needs be directed toward those who are most affected by it.

*Editor’s Note: The original article incorrectly referenced The New Times instead of The New York Times.