[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 13236]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   CONDEMNING RESTRICTIVE VOTING LAWS

  (Ms. NORTON asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, Congress is about to go home for the most 
important event in any democracy: the November 8 elections. We will 
leave a cloud over our democracy in failing to update the 1965 Voting 
Rights Act, recommended by the Supreme Court, when it struck down 
section 4 requiring Federal preclearance of State laws with a history 
of discrimination.
  My resolution, H. Res. 846, condemning restrictive voting laws, 
documents that no sooner was preclearance overturned than States 
galloped to pass new onerous voting restrictions. So unconstitutional 
were these laws that not only in southern States but also, even without 
the preclearance process, they have been struck down in four States: 
Texas, North Carolina, Wisconsin, and Ohio.
  Seldom has Congress had so much real-time evidence of the need to 
renew legislation. The evidence is a virtual mandate for Congress to 
make history again and update our democracy by updating the Voting 
Rights Act.

                          ____________________