House Delays Renewal of Voting Rights Act

WASHINGTON, June 20 — House Republican leaders today abruptly canceled a planned vote to renew the Voting Rights Act after a rank-and-file rebellion by lawmakers who say the civil rights measure unfairly singles out Southern states and promotes multi-lingual ballots.Source

Click to expand...

So why would they not want this to pass? I don't understand how in this day and age there are still even questions to bring such issues up at all. I don't see how this bill "unfairly" singles out any southern states nor any problem with multi-lingual ballots. Much of the south, even today, are still notorious for active discrimination against minorities - plz correct me if I'm wrong.

I guess most ppl are unaware that voting is not a constitutional right but a state privalegde as is driving? Surprised? I am.

Here's more on this act - source

Originally posted by jfuh:
So why would they not want this to pass? I don't understand how in this day and age there are still even questions to bring such issues up at all. I don't see how this bill "unfairly" singles out any southern states nor any problem with multi-lingual ballots. Much of the south, even today, are still notorious for active discrimination against minorities - plz correct me if I'm wrong.

Click to expand...

You're not wrong. The thing to realize is they [the GOP] are doing this by design. This is one of the illegal tactics the GOP uses to steal elections. It's not the color of the voter they are objecting too. It's the color of their vote!

They have discovered a neat little trick. Accuse black soldiers (who are overseas in Iraq and Afganistan serving their country) of trying to vote with fraudelant addresses.

Democracy in chains
US Republicans are planning to change the law to stop black, Hispanic and Native American voters going to the polls in 2008.
Greg Palast June 23, 2006 05:03 PM

In the 2004 election, more than 3 million voters were challenged at the polls. No one had seen anything like it since the era of Jim Crow and burning crosses. In 2004, voters were told their registrations had been purged or that their addresses were "suspect".

Denied the right to the regular voting booths, these challenged voters were given "provisional" ballots. More than 1m of these provisional ballots
(1,090,729 of them) were tossed in the electoral dumpster uncounted.

A funny thing about those ballots: about 88% were cast by minority voters.

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/greg_palast/2006/06/voting_rights_act_nailed_to_bu.html

Click to expand...

It appears they have traded in their "hooded" bed-sheets for "printed" spreadsheets...

I didn't vote as you didn't have a choice that went with what I think. What is wrong first off with delaying the renewal since the act does not expire till 2007? Assuming they do renew it before the expiration date I don't see a problem with them taking some time to discuss if perhaps the regulations if still necessary should be shared by all states or gotten rid of if unnecessary. Why should some states have federal requirements that other states don't? I think that's a reasonable question to ask and something worth looking into especially since they have the time to do so before the act expires.