By Ian Park

High School Essay Contest Runner-Up

Equity and politics don’t often go hand-in-hand. The 2020 presidential election was no exception, and with the COVID-19 pandemic shaking up the traditional electoral process, an unprecedented number of mail-in and absentee ballots helped dictate this year’s election results. As a result, there have been many attempts, particularly by the Republican party, to delegitimize the voting power of certain demographics. However, voter suppression is far from a new phenomenon — it’s an age-old tactic that has been used by many political parties on both sides of the spectrum to systematically repress minority votes to influence elections in a more “subtle” way than literal ballot stuffing. The legal precedent for voter suppression is concerning, and the government has long been complacent in holding perpetrators accountable.

The history of Black voter suppression in America dates back to the 19th century, when Jim Crow laws introduced poll taxes, literacy tests, the Grandfather Clause, and more. Even the Supreme Court in 1937’s Breedlove v. Suttles upheld Georgia’s poll taxes.[1] The Court’s majority opinion at the time parallels the same faulty rhetoric we see today — that just because a system or law applies to all citizens, it isn’t unconstitutional or discriminatory. However, the entire premise of devices such as the poll tax was to disproportionately impact Black citizens, who were more likely to be unable to pay the tax, and hence, unable to vote. To make matters worse, organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan also forcibly intimidated Black voters, often staking out polling stations and distributing threatening leaflets in Black neighbourhoods.[2]

But what does voter suppression look like in the 21st century?
The story of voter suppression today starts with the 2000 presidential election, where last-minute recount controversies in Florida further complicated an already hotly contested presidential election. The US Civil Rights Commission found that during recounts, election supervisors often used flawed felon databases where Black voters were more likely to have prior convictions. As a direct result, Black voters were 10 times more likely than white voters to have had their ballots purged, and “Poorer countries, particularly those with large minority populations, were more likely to use voting systems with higher spoilage rates than more affluent counties with significant white populations.”[3] Eventually, Bush v. Gore declared that recounts would be stopped, but the damage was already done. The Republican party had successfully delegitmize normal election institutions, such as the methods that were used to manually recount votes.

Another blow to voter rights came in 2013’s Shelby County v. Holder, when the Supreme Court declared Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 unconstitutional. The ruling overturned Section 4a of the Act, which identified regions of the country where racial discrimination in voting was prevalent and prevented the use of “a test or device,” in determining voter eligibility.[4] It also overturned Sections 4e and 4f, which protected the ballot of those with limited English proficiency.

Aside from blatant voter purges and the repeal of key voter protections, many of the same intimidation tactics employed during the Reconstruction Era by white supremacists are still used today, with reports of armed “poll watchers” at polling stations and caravans of Trump supporters taking to the street.[5] More recently this November, voters have been turned away from the polls for wearing Black Lives Matter shirts.[6] Ballot drop boxes in Los Angeles and Boston have also been burned, invalidating hundreds of votes.[7]

In addition, Gerrymandering, the process of redrawing district lines, can either dilute or over-saturate the influence of a community’s vote. This process is often carried out by the political party in control of a state’s legislature. Gerrymandering often targets districts by demographics, packing low-income or nonwhite communities to “bleach,” or saturate surrounding communities with white voters whose ballots are ultimately more influential. According to a study conducted by the Center for American Progress, Gerrymandering flipped an average of 59 seats in the House of Representatives during recent elections.[8] If that wasn’t concerning enough, the Supreme Court ruled in 2019’s Rucho v. Common Cause that federal courts must stay out of partisan disputes over district lines. Once again, America’s judiciary chose to perpetuate disenfranchisement instead of addressing a centuries-long problem.

Although BIPOC communities have most often been the target of voter suppression, other demographics, such as low-income communities and convicted felons, are also frequently disenfranchised. For low-income voters, voter ID requirements in many states are barriers because many cannot afford costly forms of accepted identification. In 48 states, felons can’t vote while incarcerated, and until recently in states like Florida, Alabama, and Iowa, they were permanently barred from voting. Currently, there are more than six million disenfranchised felons, and it’s no surprise that it’s the minorities in these states’ prison systems that bear the brunt of this exclusion. A shocking one in 13 African Americans of voting age is disenfranchised, a rate which is more than four times greater than that of non-African Americans.[9]

And despite all of these affronts to the spirit of democracy, America continues to pride itself in its unfaltering political process and protection of basic civil rights.

An unobstructed democratic vote is a key pillar of American democracy, and institutionalized voter suppression in its many forms must be addressed by confronting wrongdoers at all levels of involvement. More legislation such as the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act of 2020 (which proposes to revise the preclearance formulas from the original 1965 VRA ruled unconstitutional in Shelby County v. Holder) as well as committees to investigate and prosecute reports of voter suppression, must be established. Empirically, legislation protecting voting rights without strong backing has had little effect. For instance, the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871 had little effect after the end of the Union’s Reconstruction-era military occupation of the South. Thus, in a new era of highly polarized and identity-based American politics, it’s more important than ever for the government to step up and ensure that the age of state-sanctioned disenfranchisement is over.

Endnotes

“BREEDLOVE v. SUTTLES, Tax Collector.” Legal Information Institute. Legal Information Institute. Accessed January 10, 2021. https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/302/277
Bump, Philip. “The Long History of Black Voter Suppression in American Politics.” The Washington Post. WP Company, April 29, 2019. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/11/02/the-long-history-of-black-voter-suppression-in-american-politics/.
U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. “Voting Irregularities in Florida During the 2000 Presidential Election.” Chapter 9: Findings and Recommendations, June 2001. https://www.usccr.gov/pubs/vote2000/report/ch9.htm.
“SHELBY COUNTY v. HOLDER.” Legal Information Institute. Legal Information Institute. Accessed January 10, 2021. https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/12-96.
Rose, Joel. “As Pro-Trump Caravans Hit Roads Across U.S., Organizers Are Upbeat Despite Tensions.” NPR. NPR, September 24, 2020. https://www.npr.org/2020/09/24/916497045/as-pro-trump-caravans-hit-roads-across-u-s-organizers-are-upbeat-despite-tension.
CBS/Associated Press. “Memphis Poll Worker Fired for Turning Away Voters with ‘Black Lives Matter’ Shirts.” CBS News. CBS Interactive, October 20, 2020. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/poll-worker-fired-turning-away-voters-wearing-blm-shirts/.
Richer, Alanna Durkin. “Man Charged in Burning of Ballot Drop Box in Boston.” ABC News. ABC News Network, October 26, 2020. https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/man-charged-burning-ballot-drop-box-boston-73837313.
Tausanovitch, Alex. “Voter-Determined Districts.” Center for American Progress, May 9, 2019. https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/democracy/reports/2019/05/09/468916/voter-determined-districts/.
Uggen, Christopher, Ryan Larson, and Sarah Shannon. “6 Million Lost Voters: State-Level Estimates of Felony Disenfranchisement, 2016.” The Sentencing Project, October 6, 2020. https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/6-million-lost-voters-state-level-estimates-felony-disenfranchisement-2016/.

Bibliography

“BREEDLOVE v. SUTTLES, Tax Collector.” Legal Information Institute. Legal Information Institute. Accessed January 10, 2021. https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/302/277
Bump, Philip. “The Long History of Black Voter Suppression in American Politics.” The Washington Post. WP Company, April 29, 2019. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/11/02/the-long-history-of-black-voter-suppression-in-american-politics/.
U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. “Voting Irregularities in Florida During the 2000 Presidential Election.” Chapter 9: Findings and Recommendations, June 2001. https://www.usccr.gov/pubs/vote2000/report/ch9.htm.
“SHELBY COUNTY v. HOLDER.” Legal Information Institute. Legal Information Institute. Accessed January 10, 2021. https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/12-96.
Rose, Joel. “As Pro-Trump Caravans Hit Roads Across U.S., Organizers Are Upbeat Despite Tensions.” NPR. NPR, September 24, 2020. https://www.npr.org/2020/09/24/916497045/as-pro-trump-caravans-hit-roads-across-u-s-organizers-are-upbeat-despite-tension.
CBS/Associated Press. “Memphis Poll Worker Fired for Turning Away Voters with ‘Black Lives Matter’ Shirts.” CBS News. CBS Interactive, October 20, 2020. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/poll-worker-fired-turning-away-voters-wearing-blm-shirts/.
Richer, Alanna Durkin. “Man Charged in Burning of Ballot Drop Box in Boston.” ABC News. ABC News Network, October 26, 2020. https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/man-charged-burning-ballot-drop-box-boston-73837313.
Tausanovitch, Alex. “Voter-Determined Districts.” Center for American Progress, May 9, 2019. https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/democracy/reports/2019/05/09/468916/voter-determined-districts/.
Uggen, Christopher, Ryan Larson, and Sarah Shannon. “6 Million Lost Voters: State-Level Estimates of Felony Disenfranchisement, 2016.” The Sentencing Project, October 6, 2020. https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/6-million-lost-voters-state-level-estimates-felony-disenfranchisement-2016/.