[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 106 (Friday, July 29, 2005)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1680]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       CELEBRATING THE 40TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE VOTING RIGHTS ACT

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. DAVID SCOTT

                               of georgia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, July 28, 2005

  Mr. SCOTT of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to celebrate August 
6, 1965, the day President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the 
historic Voting Rights Act. It and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 are two 
of the most significant civil rights statutes ever enacted. Congress 
enacted the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to protect the voting rights of 
all Americans and ended the techniques that had been used for decades 
to deny millions of minorities the right to vote.
  Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, those in the civil rights movement 
worked to get basic civil rights and voting rights enacted into 
statute. The cost for those in the movement was high: church burnings, 
bombings, shootings, and beatings. It required the ultimate sacrifice 
of ordinary Americans: James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael 
Schwerner who simply sought to register voters and Jimmie Lee Jackson 
whose death precipitated the famous march from Selma to Montgomery.
  After the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was enacted, those in the civil 
rights movement turned their attention to the importance of obtaining 
voting rights. The struggle for voting rights led nonviolent civil 
rights marchers to gather on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama 
on March 7, 1965--a day that would come to be known as ``Bloody 
Sunday'' when the bravery of the marchers was tested by a brutal 
response, with many marchers being beaten.
  The Voting Rights Act provided extensive protections by prohibiting 
any voting practice that serves as an impediment to the right to vote, 
such as: intimidation, voter harassment, poll taxes, literacy tests, 
language barriers, racial gerrymandering and other tools of 
disenfranchisement. It also provided for criminal and civil sanctions 
against persons interfering with the right to vote.
  It is clear that the Voting Rights Act has been a great success. 
Consider the statistics. At the time the Act was adopted, only one-
third of all African Americans of voting age were on the registration 
rolls in the specially covered states, while two-thirds of eligible 
whites were registered. In some states, fewer than five percent of 
African Americans were registered.
  Today, African American voter registration rates are approaching 
parity with that of whites in many areas, and Hispanic voters in 
jurisdictions added to the list of those specially covered by the Act 
in 1975 are not far behind. Also, thanks to the Voting Rights Act, 
today there are 81 members of Congress of African American, Latino, 
Asian and Native American descent, and thousands of minorities in 
elected offices around the country. Despite the progress from 40 years 
of enforcement of the Voting Rights Act, voter inequities, disparities, 
and obstacles still remain for far too many minority voters.
  It is important that we recognize this significant anniversary 
because The Voting Rights Act is an expression of important American 
values--equality, nondiscrimination, fairness, and ensuring the full 
participation in our society by everyone. Therefore, I celebrate this 
anniversary with pride and reflection knowing that although we have 
come a long way, we still have great distance to go in order to fulfill 
our nation's ideals of equality and equal opportunity.

                          ____________________