Late Friday, the Southern Coalition for Social Justice submitted an amicus brief on behalf of Democracy North Carolina urging a three-judge state court panel in Common Cause v. Lewis to reject the “remedial” State Senate and House redistricting plans enacted by the General Assembly a little over a week ago. SCSJ and Democracy NC argued that those plans fail to eliminate the partisan bias that led the court to invalidate the prior plans as unconstitutional partisan gerrymanders.
Coalition of Civic Organizations Sues North Carolina for Failing to Comply with Federal Voting Rights Obligations
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 15, 2015 Contacts Michael McDunnah, Project Vote 202-905-1397 / mmcdunnah@projectvote.org Hayley Home, Morrison Foerster 415-268-6021 / hhome@mofo.com Donté Donald, Demos 212-485-6062 / ddonald@demos.org Allison Riggs, Southern Coalition for Social Justice 919-323-3380 ext. 117 / allison@southerncoalition.org Stacie Burgess, Lawyers’ Committee 202-445-6101 / sburgess@lawyerscommittee.org Coalition of Civic […]
North Carolina Supreme Court Upholds Racially Gerrymandered Districts
Today the North Carolina Supreme Court issued its long-awaited ruling upholding North Carolina’s state legislative and Congressional redistricting plans. The North Carolina NAACP, the League of Women Voters, the North Carolina A. Philip Randolph Institute, Democracy NC and dozens of individual voters sued the state over the redistricting plans in November 2011. The case has […]
How The Fight Against Voting Rights Restrictions Could Decide This Year's Marquee Senate Race
DURHAM, N.C. — President Barack Obama won North Carolina by just 14,000 votes in 2008. Now, as Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) and state House Speaker Thom Tillis (R) go head to head in a race that will determine which party controls the Senate, the state’s voter turnout is in question: Will voting rights restrictions passed […]
Mistrust in North Carolina Over Plan to Reduce Precincts
By RICHARD FAUSSET for the New York Times, JULY 7, 2014 SHELBY, N.C. — When Alan Langley, a Republican member of the local elections board here, explains a new proposal to consolidate five voting precincts into two, it sounds procedural and well-meaning: He speaks of convenient parking and wheelchair access at the proposed polling places, […]
Engaging young voters
Young Voters Young people can be a difficult audience to reach and enthuse about political issues. NARAL Pro-Choice North Carolina Foundation tackled this challenge by partnering with other nonprofits to sponsor a day-long Reproductive Justice Summit targeting youth ages 16-24 for a series of advocacy skill and education sessions. SCSJ voting rights organizing intern, Xan […]
SCSJ's Statement on NC Supreme Court Redistricting Hearing
On Monday, January 6, 2014 the Southern Coalition for Social Justice (SCSJ) presented oral arguments before the North Carolina Supreme Court, urging the court to find that the 2011 redistricting maps are unconstitutional and racially discriminatory. During the summer 2013 trial, SCSJ represented several statewide nonpartisan groups, including the League of Women Voters of North […]