Voting Rights Act

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed to enforce the Fifteenth Amendment, which bars denying the right to vote on account of race. It followed civil rights protests such as the march in Selma, Alabama, and barred practices such as literacy tests that had kept Black citizens from voting in the South.

Its main provisions include a nationwide ban on voting practices that discriminate on the basis of race or color (Section 2), the bilingual-ballot requirements for certain jurisdictions and a special regime under which jurisdictions with a history of discrimination had to get federal approval before changing election rules, known as preclearance (Sections 4 and 5). Congress has reauthorized the law several times, most recently in 2006. In 1982, Congress amended Section 2 to forbid practices with discriminatory results, not only intent.

In Shelby County v. Holder (2013), the Supreme Court struck down the coverage formula for preclearance, which effectively ended it. Section 2 remains in force, and courts continue to hear lawsuits over district maps and voting rules, as in Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee (2021), which set guideposts for evaluating Section 2 claims about rules like Voter ID. Supporters call the law essential; critics argue its remedies have outlasted the conditions that justified them and sometimes encourage racial sorting in gerrymandering.