The Voting Rights Act was signed into law forty-nine years ago, seeking to effectively extend the franchise in-full to black Americans. Although its initial enforcement at state and local levels often ranged from the superficial to the entirely absent, that historic legislation served as the foundation for subsequent civil rights suits that forced governments to […]
Voting Rights and Mass Incarceration
With SCSJ attorneys in federal court hearings this week fighting against North Carolina’s voter suppression laws and the second Clean Slate Clinic in Durham quickly approaching, the disenfranchisement of the justice-involved population is a central topic for SCSJ this week. Voting Rights and Mass Incarceration at the National Level According to The Sentencing Project, there […]
NC Voting Rights Rollbacks: The New Selma?
In March of 1965, the Selma-to-Montgomery march began with hopes of creating voting equality. Hundreds of civil rights activists and demonstrators attempted to march from Selma, Alabama to Montgomery, Alabama in protest of Jim Crow voter suppression measures such as literacy tests, poll taxes, grandfather clauses, and the general practice of intimidation. Pivotal moments of […]