[Senate Report 109-295]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
Calendar No. 523
109th Congress Report
SENATE
2d Session 109-295
======================================================================
FANNIE LOU HAMER, ROSA PARKS, CORETTA SCOTT KING, AND CESAR E. CHAVEZ
VOTING RIGHTS ACT REAUTHORIZATION AND AMENDMENTS ACT OF 2006
_______
July 26, 2006.--Ordered to be printed
_______
Mr. Specter, from the Committee on the Judiciary, submitted the
following
R E P O R T
together with
ADDITIONAL VIEWS
[To accompany S. 2703]
[Including cost estimate of the Congressional Budget Office]
The Committee on the Judiciary, to which was referred the
bill (S. 2703) to amend the Voting Rights Act of 1965 having
considered the same, reports favorably thereon with an
amendment and recommends that the bill (as amended) do pass.
CONTENTS
Page
I. Purpose of the Voting Rights Act.................................2
II. History of the Bill and Committee Consideration..................2
III. Section-by-Section Summary of the Bill...........................4
IV. Congressional Budget Office Cost Estimate........................5
V. Regulatory Impact Evaluation.....................................7
VI. History of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.........................7
VII. Expiring Provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965............10
VIII.The House and Senate Records....................................10
IX. Clarifications to the Voting Rights Act of 1965.................15
X. Additional Views of Mr. Kyl.....................................22
XI. Additional Views of Mr. Cornyn and Mr. Coburn...................25
XII. Additional Views of Mr. Leahy, Mr. Kennedy, Mr. Biden, Mr. Kohl,
Mrs. Feinstein, Mr. Feingold, Mr. Schumer, and Mr. Durbin.......54
XIII.Changes in Existing Law Made by the Bill, as Reported...........55
XIV. Appendices......................................................65
I. Purpose of the Voting Rights Act
The Voting Rights Act of 1965, Pub. L. 89-110, 79 Stat.
437, as amended, 42 U.S.C. Sec. Sec. 1973 to 1973bb-1 (2000),
was enacted to remedy 95 years of pervasive racial
discrimination in voting, which resulted in the almost complete
disenfranchisement of minorities in certain areas of the
country. The Act is rightly lauded as the crown jewel of our
civil rights laws because it has enabled racial minorities to
participate in the political life of the nation. We recognize
the great strides that have been made in the treatment of
racial minorities over the last forty years, but extending the
expiring provisions of the Voting Rights Act is still necessary
to continue to fulfill its purpose. For these reasons, the
Committee reported favorably on, and passed, S. 2703, the
Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King, and Cesar E.
Chavez Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act,
which extends for twenty-five years certain provisions of the
Voting Rights Act of 1965 that are set to expire in 2007, and
which amends several provisions of the Act to ensure that it
can continue to serve its historic purpose.
II. History of the Bill and Committee Consideration
From October 18, 2005, through March 8, 2006, the
Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House Judiciary
Committee held ten hearings featuring testimony from forty
witnesses. Those hearings gathered evidence concerning voting
rights in America and explored the effects of two Supreme Court
decisions: Georgia v. Ashcroft, 539 U.S. 461 (2003), and Reno
v. Bossier Parish School Board, 528 U.S. 320 (2000) (Bossier
Parish II).
On April 27, 2006, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a
hearing at which members of the House of Representatives
submitted the voluminous record it had developed over the
previous six months.
On May 3, 2006, the House and Senate introduced identical
proposals to renew and amend the Voting Rights Act of 1965
(H.R. 9 and S. 2703).
On May 9, 2006, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a
hearing on ``An Introduction to the Expiring Provisions of the
Voting Rights Act.'' The Committee heard testimony from
Chandler Davidson, political science professor at Rice
University; Richard Hasen, law professor at Loyola Law School;
Samuel Issacharoff, law professor at Columbia Law School; Ted
Shaw, President of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational
Fund, Inc. (NAACP-LDF); and Laughlin McDonald, Director of the
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Voting Rights Project. At
each hearing, in addition to their oral testimony at the
hearing, witnesses also submitted written testimony and
articles they had written on this topic and answered written
questions by Committee members.
On May 10, 2006, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a
hearing on ``Modern Enforcement of the Voting Rights Act.'' The
Committee heard testimony from Gregory Coleman, former
Solicitor General of Texas; Frank Strickland, attorney and
member of the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections
in Georgia; Robert McDuff, a civil rights litigator in
Mississippi; Juan Cartegena, General Counsel, Community Service
Society in New York City; and Natalie Landreth, attorney for
the Native American Rights Fund in Anchorage, Alaska.
On May 16, 2006, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a
hearing on ``The Continued Need for Section 5.'' The Committee
heard testimony from the following witnesses: Richard Pildes,
Professor of Law at New York University; Ronald Keith Gaddie,
Professor of Political Science at the University of Oklahoma;
Pamela Karlan, Professor of Law at Stanford University; Anita
Earls, Director of the Center for Civil Rights at the
University of North Carolina and former Deputy Assistant
Attorney General for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of
Justice; and Ted Arrington, Professor of Political Science at
the University of North Carolina and a former Republican
elected official in North Carolina.
On May 17, 2006, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a
hearing on ``The Benefits and Costs of Section 5.'' The
Committee heard testimony from the following witnesses: Abigail
Thernstrom, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and Vice-
Chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights; Nathaniel
Persily, Professor of Law and Political Science at the
University of Pennsylvania; Fred Gray, Alabama civil rights
attorney and former counsel for Rosa Parks and Martin Luther
King, Jr.; Drew Days, Professor of Law at Yale University,
former Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, and former
Solicitor General of the United States; and Armand Derfner, a
voting rights attorney in South Carolina.
On June 13, 2006, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a
hearing on ``The Continuing Need for Section 203's Provisions
for Limited English Proficient Voters.'' The Committee heard
testimony from John Trasvina, Interim President and General
Counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education
Fund (MALDEF); Mauro Mujica, Chairman and CEO of U.S. English;
Peter Kirsanow, Commissioner on the U.S. Commission on Civil
Rights and member of the National Labor Relations Board;
Margaret Fung, Executive Director of the Asian-American Legal
Defense and Education Fund; Deborah Wright, Los Angeles County
Executive Liaison Officer and Acting Assistant Registrar for
the Election Services Bureau; and Linda Chavez, Chairman of the
Center for Equal Opportunity and President of One Nation
Indivisible.
On June 21, the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil
rights and Property Rights of the Senate Judiciary Committee
held a hearing on ``Reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act:
Policy Perspectives and Views from the Field.'' The
Subcommittee heard testimony from Debo Adegbile, Associate
Director of Litigation of the NAACP Legal Defense and
Educational Fund, Inc.; Gerald A. Reynolds, Chairman of the
U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and Assistant General Counsel
of Kansas City Power & Light Co.; David Canon, Professor in the
Department of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin;
John J. Park, Jr., an Assistant Attorney General in the Office
of the Attorney General of Alabama; Donald M. Wright, General
Counsel of the North Carolina State Board of Elections; and
Carol Swain, Professor of Political Science and Professor of
Law at Vanderbilt University.
On July 10, 2006, the Subcommittee on the Constitution,
Civil Rights and Property Rights of the Senate Judiciary
Committee held a testimony-only hearing on ``The Continuing
Need for Federal Examiners and Observers to Ensure Electoral
Integrity.'' The Subcommittee received testimony from Mark F.
(Thor) Hearne, II, National Counsel to the American Center for
Voting Rights--Legislative Fund; Kay Coles James, former
Director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management; Constance
Slaughter-Harvey, an attorney in private practice in Forest,
Mississippi, and former Mississippi Assistant Secretary of
State for Elections and General Counsel; Dr. James Thomas
Tucker, voting rights consultant to the National Association of
Latino Elected and Appointed Officials; and Alfred Yazzie,
Navajo Language Consultant for the U.S. Department of Justice
and Certified Navajo Interpreter.
On July 13, 2006, the Subcommittee on the Constitution,
Civil Rights and Property Rights of the Senate Judiciary
Committee held a hearing on ``Renewing the Temporary Provisions
of the Voting Rights Act: Legislative Options after LULAC v.
Perry.'' The Subcommittee heard testimony from Roger Clegg,
President and General Counsel of the Center for Equal
Opportunity in Sterling, Virginia; Professor Sherrilyn Ifill,
professor at the University of Maryland Law School in Baltimore
and former Assistant Counsel at the NAACP Legal Defense and
Educational Fund, Inc.; Nina Perales, Southwest Regional
Counsel for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational
Fund (MALDEF); Michael Carvin, a partner with the law firm of
Jones Day, specializing in constitutional, appellate, civil
rights, and civil litigation against the Federal Government;
Professor Joaquin Avila, Assistant Professor of Law at Seattle
University School of Law in Seattle, Washington; and Abigail
Thernstrom, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and Vice
Chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
On July 19, 2006, the Senate Judiciary Committee met in
open session to consider the bill S. 2703. A technical
amendment was offered by Mr. Leahy to provide that the short
title of the bill, S. 2703, would be expanded to include the
name of Cesar E. Chavez. The technical amendment was agreed to
by voice vote. An amendment was offered by Dr. Coburn to
provide that persons who state that they speak English ``well''
in response to the Census Bureau's inquiry would not be
considered limited-English proficient under section 203(b)(3)
of the Voting Rights Act. The amendment was defeated by voice
vote. The motion to report favorably the bill, S. 2703, was
agreed by a roll call vote of 18-0.
III. Section-by-Section Summary of the Bill
Section 1
Section 1, as amended, provides that the Act may be cited
as the ``Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King, and
Cesar E. Chavez Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and
Amendments Act of 2006.''
Section 2
Section 2 explains that the ``purpose of this Act is to
ensure that the right of all citizens to vote, including the
right to register to vote and cast meaningful votes, is
preserved and protected as guaranteed by the Constitution.''
Section 2 sets forth the Senate's findings that ``[s]ignificant
progress has been made,'' but ``vestiges of discrimination in
voting continue to exist.''
Section 3
Section 3 eliminates the provisions for federal election
examiners, who, in the past, were used to ensure that voters
were not excluded from voter registration lists. These
examiners have not been used for that purpose in over 20 years.
Section 3 also eliminates the provisions for terminating
federal examiner certifications. In the remaining provisions of
the Act, all references to federal examiners have been replaced
with references to federal observers.
Section 3 also alters one of the standards for certifying
jurisdictions for federal observer coverage. Currently, the
Attorney General may appoint federal observers to monitor
polling places in covered jurisdictions if the Attorney General
has received written complaints from at least twenty residents
who have been denied the right to vote by the government.
Section 3 amends the Voting Rights Act to allow the Attorney
General to do so provided that at least two ``residents,
elected officials, or civic participation organizations'' have
complained in writing that voting rights violations ``are
likely to occur.''
Section 4
Section 4 provides for a 25-year renewal of the coverage
formula stated in section 4 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
It also requires Congress to reconsider these provisions in 15
years.
Section 5
Section 5 responds to, in part, two Supreme Court decisions
that interpreted the criteria for preclearance of voting
changes under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965: Reno
v. Bossier Parish School Board, 528 U.S. 320 (2000) (Bossier
Parish II), and Georgia v. Ashcroft, 539 U.S. 461 (2003).
Section 6
Section 6 amends the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to allow
certain prevailing plaintiffs to collect ``reasonable expert
fees, and other reasonable litigation expenses.''
Section 7
Section 7 extends the requirements of section 203 of the
Voting Rights Act of 1965 through 2032.
Section 8
Section 8 allows use of American Community Survey census
data under the Act.
IV. Congressional Budget Office Cost Estimate
The Committee sets forth, with respect to the bill, S.
2703, the following estimate and comparison prepared by the
Director of the Congressional Budget Office under section 402
of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974:
July 20, 2006.
Hon. Arlen Specter,
Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary,
U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
Dear Mr. Chairman: The Congressional Budget Office has
prepared the enclosed cost estimate for S. 2703, the Fannie Lou
Hamer, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King, and Cesar E. Chavez
Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006.
If you wish further details on this estimate, we will be
pleased to provide them. The CBO staff contact is Matthew
Pickford.
Sincerely,
Donald B. Marron,
Acting Director.
Enclosure.
Summary: S. 2703 would reauthorize and amend the Voting
Rights Act of 1965. Major provisions of the legislation would
extend certain expiring provisions of the act for 25 years,
expand the use of federal observers at polling sites, and
authorize the use of the American Community Survey to identify
areas that may need bilingual voting assistance.
CBO estimates that implementing S. 2703 would cost $1
million in fiscal year 2007 and $15 million over the 2007-2011
period, subject to the availability of appropriated funds.
Enacting the bill would have no impact on direct spending or
revenues.
Section 4 of the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA)
excludes from the application of the act any legislative
provisions that enforce constitutional rights of individuals.
CBO has determined that S. 2703 would fall within that
exclusion because it would protect the voting rights of
minorities and those with limited proficiency in English.
Therefore, CBO has not reviewed the bill for mandates.
Estimated cost to the Federal Government: The estimated
budgetary impact of S. 2703 is shown in the following table.
The costs of this legislation fall within budget function 800
(general government).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By fiscal year, in millions of dollars--
--------------------------------------------
2007 2008 2009 2010 2011
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SPENDING SUBJECT TO APPROPRIATION
OPM spending under current law for voting rights program:
Estimated authorization level.................................. 2 0 0 0 0
Estimated outlays.............................................. 2 0 0 0 0
Proposed changes:
Estimated authorization level.................................. 1 4 3 3 3
Estimated outlays.............................................. 1 4 3 3 3
OPM spending under S. 2703 for voting rights program:
Estimated authorization level.................................. 3 4 3 3 3
Estimated outlays.............................................. 3 4 3 3 3
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: OPM = Office of Personnel Management.
Basis of estimate: For this estimate, CBO assumes that S.
2703 will be enacted near the end of fiscal year 2006, that the
necessary amounts will be appropriated over the 2007-2011
period, and that spending will follow historical spending
patterns for the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).
The legislation would extend for 25 years certain expiring
provisions of the Voting Rights Act. Under current law, the
Department of Justice (DOJ) certifies the appointment of
federal observers to work at polling sites when it has received
20 or more written complaints from residents regarding voting
rights violations. OPM, through its Voting Rights Program,
works closely with DOJ to assign voting rights observers to
locations designated by the department. OPM currently has about
1,000 intermittent employees who serve as neutral monitors at
particular polling sites on election days. Since 1966, OPM has
deployed 26,000 observers to 22 states.
The legislation would amend current law to authorize the
Attorney General to assign federal observers without using the
certification process to election sites if he or she has had a
reasonable belief that violations of the 14th or 15th amendment
have occurred or will occur at a polling site. Based on
information from OPM and the current cost of operating the
observer program, CBO estimates that the Voting Rights Program
would spend about $4 million in general election years and
about $3 million in other years.
Intergovernmental and private-sector impact: Section 4 of
UMRA excludes from the application of the act any legislative
provisions that enforce constitutional rights of individuals.
CBO has determined that S. 2703 would fall within that
exclusion because it would protect the voting rights of
minorities and those with limited proficiency in English.
Therefore, CBO has not reviewed the bill for mandates.
Previous CBO estimate: On May 17, 2006, CBO transmitted a
cost estimate for H.R. 9, the Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, and
Coretta Scott King Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and
Amendments Act of 2006, as ordered reported by the House
Committee on the Judiciary on May 10, 2006. The two versions of
the bill are similar and CBO's cost estimates for these bills
are identical.
Estimate prepared by: Federal Costs: Matthew Pickford;
impact on state, local, and tribal governments: Sarah Puro;
impact on the private-sector: Paige Piper/Bach.
Estimate approved by: Peter H. Fontaine, Deputy Assistant
Director for Budget Analysis.
V. Regulatory Impact Evaluation
In compliance with rule XXVI of the Standing Rules of the
Senate, the Committee finds that no significant regulatory
impact will result from the enactment of S. 2703.
VI. History of the Voting Rights Act of 1965
In 1965, Congress at last began to fulfill our Nation's
promise of full participation in the democratic process for all
Americans by passing the Voting Rights Act. That Act created
permanent, nationwide protection for every American citizen,
protections that remain vital to voters today. It also created
certain temporary provisions, which were reauthorized and
expanded in 1970,\1\ 1975,\2\ 1982,\3\ and (with respect to
language assistance) 1992.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1970, Pub. L. 91-285, 84 Stat.
314.
\2\ Pub. L. 94-73, 89 Stat. 402 (1975).
\3\ Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1982, Pub. L. 97-205, 96 Stat.
134.
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Prior to the enactment of the Voting Rights Act, African-
Americans and other minorities were prevented from exercising
their constitutional rights through violence, intimidation, and
systematic and deliberate State action.
Tragically, there are too many examples of this overt
hatred and discrimination to detail them all in this record.
But understanding the environment of bigotry that led to the
Act's passage helps to understand its applicability today and
in the future.
The effort to give all voters full access to the ballot box
was thwarted systematically and violently. In 1961, the Student
Non-violent Coordinating Committee began a black voter
registration drive in McComb, Mississippi, led by ``Robert
Moses, a black field secretary who had quit his job as a
private-school mathematics teacher in New York to work full
time on voter registration in the South.'' Abigail Thernstrom,
Whose Vote Counts? 14 (Harvard University Press, 1987). ``Moses
was attacked and beaten by a cousin of the sheriff; a co-worker
was ordered out of a registrar's office at gunpoint and then
hit with a pistol; a black sympathizer was murdered by a state
representative; another black who asked for Justice Department
protection to testify at the inquest was beaten (and three
years later killed); a white activist's eye was gouged out;
and, finally, twelve SNCC workers and local supporters were
fined and sentenced to substantial terms in jail.'' Id. And
those were just a few of many incidents.
The ``usual'' legislation, however, had failed to break the
usual pattern of black disfranchisement. Voting rights
litigators in the South in the early 1960s had learned several
lessons. The first concerned the literacy test. ``No matter
from what direction one looks at it,'' V.O. Key had written in
1949, ``the Southern literacy test is a fraud and nothing
more.'' It was no less a fraud in 1965. In the 1960s, southern
registrars were observed testing black applicants on such
matters as the number of bubbles in a soap bar, the news
contained in a copy of the Peking Daily, the meaning of obscure
passages in state constitutions, and the definition of such
terms as habeas corpus. By contrast, even illiterate whites
were being registered. Booker T. Washington had believed that
``brains, property, and character'' would ``settle the question
of civil rights,'' but eighty years after the founding of
Tuskegee Institute blacks with brains, property, and character
in the city of Tuskegee still found themselves unable to
demonstrate their literacy. ``If a fella makes a mistake on his
questionnaire, I'm not gonna discriminate in his favor just
because he's got a Ph.D.,'' the chairman of the Board of
Registrars self-righteously maintained. Id. at 15.
``The long struggle for black voting rights during the
Twentieth Century crested on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma,
when peaceful demonstrators were savagely attacked by law
enforcement officers on March 7, 1965.'' Testimony of Chandler
Davidson, An Introduction to the Expiring Provisions of the
Voting Rights Act and Legal Issues Relating to Reauthorization,
Hrg. before the Senate Judiciary Committee (May 9, 2006). This
``Bloody Sunday, was filmed by news photographers and
immediately telecast around the world. It shocked the
conscience of America, and at the behest of President Lyndon
Johnson, a bipartisan Congress passed the Voting Rights Act a
few months later.'' Id.
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was designed to ``foster our
transformation to a society that is no longer fixated on
race,'' to an ``all-inclusive community, where we would be able
to forget about race and color and see people as people, as
human beings, just as citizens.'' Georgia v. Ashcroft, 539 U.S.
461, 490 (2003) (quoting Rep. John Lewis). The Act includes a
permanent provision, section 2, that applies to every voter in
America. ``As amended by Congress in 1982, it prohibits any
voting qualification or practice that results in denial or
abridgement of voting rights on the basis of a citizen's race,
color, or membership in one of four language-minority groups:
speakers of Spanish or of Native American, Native Alaskan, and
Asian languages.'' Testimony of Chandler Davidson, supra. The
Act also includes several temporary provisions that ``Congress
renewed and expanded * * * in 1970, 1975, and 1982, the last
time for 25 years.'' Id.
Congress's enactment of the Voting Rights Act presaged an
immediate and breathtaking transformation. The Voting Rights
Act of 1965 had a concrete impact on individuals' lives.
``Maynard Jackson's mother (in her middle age) was the first
black in Atlanta to obtain a library card; in 1973 her son was
elected mayor. In Selma, Alabama, in 1965, Andrew Young placed
his life in jeopardy on behalf of black voting rights; only
seven years later he was the first black congressman elected
from the Deep South since Reconstruction.'' Abigail Thernstrom,
Whose Vote Counts? 1 (Harvard University Press, 1987).
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 had a concrete impact on
Americans' attitudes and beliefs. In 1975, only 20% of African-
Americans said they had good friends who were white; by 2003,
the figure had jumped to 88%. And the proportion of whites with
good friends who were African American soared from 9% to 82%.
Testimony of Abigail Thernstrom, Understanding the Benefits and
Costs of Section 5 Pre-Clearance, Hrg. before the Senate
Judiciary Committee (May 17, 2006).
Similarly, the Voting Rights Act had a concrete impact on
America's political landscape. The covered jurisdictions that
once sponsored violence against minority voters now elect
hundreds of minorities to elected office. In Georgia, the
voting age population is 27.2% African-American, and African-
Americans comprise 30.7% of its delegation to the U.S. House of
Representatives and 26.5% of the officials elected statewide.
U.S. Census Bureau Report on 2004 Election; The Bullock-Gaddie
Voting Rights Studies: An Analysis of Section 5 of the Voting
Rights Act (2006). Black candidates in Mississippi have
achieved similar success. The State's voting age population is
34.1% African-American, and 29.5% of its representatives in the
State House and 25% of its delegation to the U.S. House of
Representatives are African-American. Id. As of 2003, Texas had
elected 2,000 Latinos to office; two years before, California
voters had sent 757 Latinos to office. Id. America has had two
African-American Secretaries of State, Colin Powell and
Condoleezza Rice--both of whom have been touted as formidable
candidates for President of the United States, and two African-
American Supreme Court Justices, legendary civil rights lawyer
Thurgood Marshall, and former head of the Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission Clarence Thomas.
Congress is once again confronted with the expiration of
several of the Voting Rights Act's temporary provisions. The
five provisions of the Voting Rights Act set to expire in June
and August of 2007 are sections 4, 5, 6, 8, and 203.\4\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\4\ Sections 7 and 9, which provide additional procedures for
examiners appointed under section 6, expire together with section 6.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
VII. Expiring Provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965
Five provisions of the Voting Rights Act are set to expire
in June and August of 2007.
Section 4(b) of the Act sets out a formula to identify
discriminatory, or ``covered,'' jurisdictions. 42 U.S.C.
Sec. 1973b(b). In 1965, a political subdivision was covered
under section 4(b) if (1) it used a literacy test or other
device as a condition for voter registration on November 1,
1964, and (2) either less than 50% of eligible persons were
registered to vote on that date or less than 50% of such
persons voted in the Presidential election of that year. Id.
Congress has since added similar triggers using data from 1968
and 1972. Id. Congress has also added jurisdictions with a
significant population of non-English speakers. 42 U.S.C.
Sec. 1973b(f).
Section 5 provides that if a jurisdiction is covered under
section 4(b), then all voting laws in that jurisdiction must be
pre-approved either by the Justice Department or the federal
district court for the District of Columbia, with the burden of
proof on the jurisdiction to show an absence of discriminatory
purpose or effect. 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1973c.
Section 203 requires covered jurisdictions to provide
bilingual elections for American Indians, Asian Americans,
Alaskan Natives, or persons of Spanish heritage who are not
proficient in English.
Sections 6 and 8 ensure that minority voters may register
to vote and cast their ballots. Section 6 provides for federal
election examiners to prepare and maintain lists of eligible
voters in covered jurisdictions. Section 8 provides for federal
election observers to ensure that all voters are permitted to
cast their ballots and that all ballots are properly counted.
VIII. The House and Senate Records
The Senate Judiciary Committee held nine hearings regarding
the bill, S. 2703, at which the Committee received testimony
from 46 witnesses. In addition, the House Judiciary Committee
held 12 hearings featuring 46 witnesses. The total record
consists of over 15,000 pages. The House and Senate owe thanks
to the many groups dedicated to the civil rights of Americans
which, over the past two years, have collected and analyzed
evidence regarding voting rights in America.
Just as it did for each previous enactment and
reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act in 1965, 1970, 1975,
and 1982, the Senate collected data consisting of statistics,
findings by courts and the Justice Department, and first-hand
accounts of discrimination.
A. STATISTICAL EVIDENCE
1. Minority Registration and Turnout
In 1965, there was significant evidence that black
registration was dramatically lower than white registration,
and that this significant difference was explained primarily by
the purposeful attempts to disenfranchise black citizens.
Indeed, in some states, the gap was 50 percentage points. In
Alabama, black registration was just 18.5% and in Mississippi,
was a dismal 6.4%. Voting Rights Legislation, Sen. Rep. 89-162,
at 44 (1965).
Due to the Voting Rights Act of 1965, minorities in covered
jurisdictions have made great strides over time. Indeed,
presently in seven of the covered States, African-Americans are
registered at a rate higher than the national average.
Moreover, in California, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina,
and Texas, black registration and turnout in the 2004 election
(the most recent Presidential election) was higher than that
for whites. In Louisiana and South Carolina, African-American
registration was 4 percentage points lower than that for
whites--a rate identical to the national average. Virginia,
however, remains an outlier: in the 2004 election, black
registration was 7 percentage points lower than the national
average, black registration was 11 percentage points lower than
white registration, and black turnout was 13 percentage points
lower than white turnout. There is some reason to believe that
without the Voting Rights Act's deterrent effect on potential
misconduct, these rates might be considerably worse.
In the 2004 election, nationwide, Latinos registered and
turned out at rates significantly lower than white voters in
the 2004 election--roughly 30 percentage points lower. In Texas
and California, the gap was slightly smaller--26 percentage
points in each State.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2004 Registration 2004 Turnout
State ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Minority White Minority White
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alabama............................. Black: 72.9%........... 73.8% Black: 63.9%........... 62.2%
Alaska.............................. n/a.................... n/a Native: 41.4%.......... Non-Native:
68.4%
Arizona............................. Black: 55.3%........... 61.4% Black: 45.6%........... 55.8%
Latino: 30.5%.......... ........... Latino: 25.5%.......... ...........
California.......................... Black: 67.9%........... 56.4% Black: 61.3%........... 51.3%
Latino: 30.2%.......... ........... Latino: 25.6%.......... ...........
Florida............................. Black: 52.6%........... 64.7% Black: 44.5%........... 58.4%
Latino: 38.2%.......... ........... Latino: 34.0%.......... ...........
Georgia............................. Black: 64.2%........... 63.5% Black: 54.4%........... 53.6%
Louisiana........................... Black: 71.1%........... 75.1% Black: 62.1%........... 64.0%
Mississippi......................... Black: 76.1%........... 72.3% Black: 66.8%........... 58.9%
North Carolina...................... Black: 70.4%........... 69.4% Black: 63.1%........... 58.1%
South Carolina...................... Black: 71.1%........... 74.4% Black: 59.5%........... 63.4%
Texas............................... Black: 68.4%........... 61.5% Black: 55.8%........... 50.6%
Latino: 41.5%.......... ........... Latino: 29.3%.......... ...........
Virginia............................ Black: 57.4%........... 68.2% Black: 49.6%........... 63.0%
Nationwide.......................... Black: 64.3%........... 67.9% Black: 56.1%........... 60.3%
Latino: 34.3%.......... ........... Latino: 28.0%.......... ...........
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Source for Citizen Minority Voting Age Population: U.S. Census Bureau Report on 2004 Election.
* Source for all other information: The Bullock-Gaddie Voting Rights Studies: An Analysis of Section 5 of the
Voting Rights Act.
2. Minority Elected Officials
For years, States had created unconstitutional barriers for
minority candidates resulting in few minorities serving in
elected office. In 1964, for example, there were only
approximately 300 African-Americans in public office, including
just three in the United States Congress. Few, if any, black
elected officials were elected anywhere in the South. While the
Constitution ``does not require proportional representation as
an imperative of political organization,'' City of Mobile v.
Bolden, 446 U.S. 55, 75-76 (1980), and the Voting Rights Act
itself specifically rejects a requirement of proportional
representation, both stand for the elimination of purposeful
obstacles to minorities holding office. The Nation has made
great progress in eliminating such obstacles--even if the work
of establishing civil rights for all is not yet complete. Much
of that progress is due to the Voting Rights Act.
According to data made available to the Senate, today there
are more than 9,100 black elected officials, including 43
members of the United States Congress, the largest number ever.
Id. at 2. ACLU, Promises to Keep: The Impact of the Voting
Rights Act in 2006 (March 2006). ``The Act has also opened the
political process for many of the approximately 6,000 Latino
public officials who have been elected and appointed
nationwide,'' including 263 at the state or federal level, 27
of whom serve in Congress. Id. Indeed in Georgia, minorities
are elected at rates proportionate to or higher than their
numbers. While Georgia's voting age population is 27.2%
African-American, 30.7% of its delegation to the U.S. House of
Representatives and 26.5% of the officials elected statewide
are African-American. Black candidates in Mississippi have
achieved similar success. The State's voting age population is
34.1% African-American, and 29.5% of its representatives in the
State House and 25% of its delegation to the U.S. House of
Representatives are African-American.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Minority
Citizen Minority Percentage
Voting Age Minority Percentage Minority Percentage Number Minority Minority Percentage in U.S.
State Population (2000 in State Senate in State House Officials (2001) in U.S. House Senate
Census) (2005) (2005) Delegation (2006) Delegation
(2006)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alabama.......................... Black: 24.5%........ 22.86%............. 25.71%............. 756................ 14.3%.............. 0%
Alaska........................... Black: 3.0%......... Black: 5.0%........ Black: 2.5%........ n/a................ 0%................. 0%
Native: 25.0%...... Native: 20.0%......
Arizona.......................... Hispanic of any Latino: 16.7% Latino: 15.0% Latino: 268 (2000). Latino: 25%........ 0%
race: 17.9%. (2003). (2003).
California....................... Hispanic of any 22.5%.............. 22.5%.............. 757 (as of 2000)... Latino: 11.3%...... 0%
race: 21.4%.
Florida.......................... Black: 13.0%........ Black: 7.5%........ Black: 13.3%....... Black: 243......... Black: 12%......... Latino: 50%
Hispanic of any Latino: 15.0%...... Latino: 9.2%....... Latino: 89......... Latino: 12%........
race: 12.6%.
Georgia.......................... Black: 27.2%........ 19.6%.............. 21.7%.............. 611................ 30.7%.............. 0%
Louisiana........................ Black: 30.0%........ 23.1%.............. 21.9%.............. 705................ 14.3%.............. 0%
Mississippi...................... Black: 34.1%........ 21.2%.............. 29.5%.............. 897................ 25%................ 0%
North Carolina................... Black: 20.5%........ 14.0%.............. 15.8%.............. 491................ 7.7%............... 0%
South Carolina................... Black: 27.8%........ 17.4%.............. 20.1%.............. 534................ 16.7%.............. 0%
Texas............................ Black: 11.6%........ Black: 6.5%........ Black: 9.3%........ Black: 460......... Black: 9.4%........ 0%
Hispanic of any Latino: 19.4%...... Latino: 18.0%...... Latino: 2,000 (as Latino: 15.6%......
race: 26.5%. of 2003).
Virginia......................... Black: 18.4%........ 12.5%.............. 11.0%.............. 246................ 9.1%............... 0%
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Source for Citizen Minority Voting Age Population: U.S. Census Bureau Report on 2004 Election.
* Source for all other information: The Bullock-Gaddie Voting Rights Studies: An Analysis of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act; Joint Center for Pol. &
Econ. Studies, Black Elected Officials 14 (2001) (Table 2), Materials.
B. COURT VERDICTS AND DOJ ENFORCEMENT
In 1965, the Congress relied upon findings by federal
courts and the Justice Department that the covered States were
engaged in a pattern of unconstitutional behavior. South
Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U.S. 301, 329-30 & nn.38, 39
(1966). For example, the 1965 Senate Report observed that
Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi had lost every voting
discrimination suit brought against them, and in the previous 8
years each State had eight or nine courts find them guilty of
violating the Constitution. Voting Rights Legislation, Sen.
Rep. No. 89-162, at 9-10 (1965).
1. Court Verdicts
The current record discusses hundreds of cases alleging
voting rights violations. Since 1982, six published cases have
ended in a court ruling or a consent decree finding that one of
the 880 covered jurisdictions had committed unconstitutional
discrimination against minority voters. The same number of
cases ended in a finding that the covered jurisdictions had
committed unconstitutional discrimination against white voters.
During that same time period, six cases have found that a non-
covered jurisdiction committed unconstitutional discrimination
against minority voters. See Appendix I for full list.
Examining Voting Rights Act cases also is instructive.
Since 1982, 39 court cases have ended with a finding that one
of the 880 covered jurisdictions had violated section 2 of the
Voting Rights Act--the permanent provision of the Voting Rights
Act that prohibits discrimination nationwide. During that same
time period, 40 court cases have ended with a finding that one
of the non-covered jurisdictions had violated section 2. See
Appendix II for full list. Plainly, the Voting Rights Act has
done much to achieve its original aims.
2. Department of Justice Enforcement Efforts
The record also indicates that the Justice Department has
issued 754 objection letters since 1982:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Percent of
submissions
Number of Number of receiving
Year submissions objection objection
letters letter
(percent)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1982............................................................... 2848 66 2.32
1983............................................................... 3203 52 1.62
1984............................................................... 3975 49 1.23
1985............................................................... 3847 37 0.96
1986............................................................... 4807 41 0.85
1987............................................................... 4478 29 0.65
1988............................................................... 5155 39 0.76
1989............................................................... 3920 30 0.77
1990............................................................... 4809 37 0.77
1991............................................................... 4592 75 1.63
1992............................................................... 5307 77 1.45
1993............................................................... 4421 69 1.56
1994............................................................... 4661 61 1.31
1995............................................................... 3999 19 0.48
1996............................................................... 4729 7 0.15
1997............................................................... 4047 8 0.20
1998............................................................... 4021 8 0.20
1999............................................................... 4012 5 0.12
2000............................................................... 4638 4 0.09
2001............................................................... 4222 7 0.17
2002............................................................... 5910 21 0.36
2003............................................................... 4628 8 0.17
2004............................................................... 5211 3 0.06
2005............................................................... 4734 1 0.002
2006............................................................... 4094 1 0.002
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Data provided by the Department of Justice, Hrg. Before the Senate Judiciary Committee (May 10, 2006)
(testimony of Wan J. Kim, Assistant Att'y Gen., Civil Rights Div.) (data current as of May 8, 2006)
It is important to note, however, that many of the
objection letters included in the above chart were the result
of the Justice Department's application of a standard
subsequently struck down by the Supreme Court as
unconstitutional. In the 1980s and 1990s, the Justice
Department required jurisdictions to include ``the maximum
number of majority-minority districts that it was possible to
create. The Supreme Court ruled that this policy amounted to
unconstitutional racial gerrymandering and struck it down.
Miller v. Johnson, 515 U.S. 900, 921 (1995); see also Bush v.
Vera, 517 U.S. 952, 958-59 (1996); Hunt v. Cromartie, 526 U.S.
541 (1999). In including in the chart objection letters that
were subsequently found unconstitutional, we do not mean to
endorse the government's earlier position that was struck down.
3. First-Hand Accounts of Voting Discrimination
Most of the record adduced in the House and Senate
Judiciary Committees is devoted to first-person accounts of
alleged discrimination. Such accounts can be significant
because they demonstrate the real impact of any ongoing
discrimination.
In 1991, Mississippi legislators rejected proposed House
and Senate redistricting plans that would have given African-
American voters greater opportunity to elect representatives of
their choice, referring to one such alternative on the House
floor as the ``black plan'' and privately as ``the n- plan.''
DOJ objected, concluding that a racially discriminatory purpose
was at play. In the 1992 elections, the cured redistricting
plans boosted the percentage of African-American
representatives in the legislature to an all time high: 27% of
the House and 19% of the Senate (up from 13% and 4%,
respectively, in a state where 33% of the voting-age population
is African-American). Robert McDuff, Voting Rights in
Mississippi: 1982-2006, RenewTheVRA.org at 9-10.
Additionally, a witness claimed that ``in North Carolina in
Alamance County, a sheriff took it upon himself to get a sample
list of Latino voters and then announce . . . I'm going to go
door to door knocking on people's houses and ask--and see proof
of citizenship.'' Leslie Lobos, Testimony at Nat'l Comm'n on
VRA Southern Reg'l Hrg., House hrg. 201 (Oct. 18, 2005). These
types of anecdotes, and the others in the record, demonstrate
that the type of behavior that may warrant oversight by federal
officials. If individuals deny minorities access to the ballot
box, equal justice is denied.
Despite the numerous examples of continued discrimination,
some of the testimony gathered indicates that certain States
have made great progress under the Voting Rights Act. For
example, a witness recounted that ``[d]uring the last
redistricting cycle, the Alaska Redistricting Board took
special care to preserve existing `Native Districts'--districts
which provided Native voters the opportunity to elect the
candidates of their choice.'' Nat'l Comm'n on VRA Report, at
57. One Arizona voting rights attorney, who had represented
voters for four decades, observed that ``Arizona was added in
1975 because of an amendment that Congress had adopted that
said a voting test included the language in which five percent
of the people, other than English, five percent of the people
spoke. To wit, Spanish. And in a state where more than 50
percent of those who were registered to vote--were not
registered to vote. Arizona was such a state, in 1975. But
Arizona is not such a state today.'' Paul Eckstein, Testimony
at Nat'l Comm'n on VRA Southwestern Reg'l Hrg., House hrg. 291
(Oct. 18, 2005). Without the Voting Rights Act, it is difficult
to know whether such progress would be possible.
The sheer bulk of the record showing both continued
problems and significant improvements--nearly 15,000 pages--
compels us to summarize these first-hand accounts of
discrimination. Accordingly, we attach Appendix III, a
comprehensive list of every account of discrimination
articulated in the House record and the Senate record available
at the time of this writing (several Senate witnesses had not
responded as of this writing).
IX. Clarifications to the Voting Rights Act of 1965
Section 5 of the legislation amends the Voting Rights Act
by abrogating, in part, two recent Supreme Court decisions:
Georgia v. Ashcroft, 539 U.S. 461 (2003), and Reno v. Bossier
Parish Sch. Bd., 528 U.S. 320 (2000) (``Bossier Parish II'').
The changes work together and are designed to protect
minorities from purposeful, unconstitutional discrimination and
to eliminate potential obstacles to minority representation in
elected bodies. With regard to redistricting plans, they
protect naturally occurring districts that have a clear
majority of minority voters.
A. PROCESS
When the Voting Rights Act was first enacted in 1965, and
for each reauthorization, consideration was initiated in the
House. This Congress followed the same practice. From October
18, 2005, through March 8, 2006, the Subcommittee on the
Constitution of the House Judiciary Committee held ten hearings
featuring testimony from forty witnesses. At those hearings,
the House gathered extensive factual evidence and considered
proposals to amend section 5 of the Voting Rights Act to
address Bossier Parish II and Georgia v. Ashcroft.
The House and Senate introduced identical versions of the
Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, and Coretta Scott King Voting
Rights Act Reauthorization Act on May 3, 2006. Because the
Senate had not yet held substantive hearings on the Senate
bill, S. 2703--other than a hearing on April 27, 2006, at which
members of the House of Representatives submitted the record
that the House had developed--we relied heavily upon the
House's examination of the proposed language in section 5. We
found particularly informative the testimony from witnesses
called to explain the meaning of and context for the new
provisions.
In the course of our consideration, concerns were raised.
The Senate Committee on the Judiciary responded by convening
hearings in which we further investigated issues implicated by
the amendments in section 5 of the bill. The Committee heard
from several witnesses who helpfully commented on the
amendments and assured us that the language reflected our
intent.
B. ``ANY DISCRIMINATORY PURPOSE''
The Supreme Court's decision in Bossier Parish II has
created a strange loophole in the law: it is possible that the
Justice Department or federal court could be required to
approve an unconstitutional voting practice ``taken with the
purpose of racial discrimination.'' Testimony of Nina Perales,
Renewing the Temporary Provisions of the Voting Rights Act:
Legislative Options after LULAC v. Perry, Hrg. before the
Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Property
Rights of the Senate Judiciary Committee (July 13, 2006).
``[A]fter Bossier Parish II, the Supreme Court has directed
preclearance authorities to permit changes that have an
unconstitutional, racially discriminatory purpose as long as
the purpose is simply to perpetuate unconstitutional conditions
and not to make them actually worse.'' Pamela S. Karlan,
Responses to Written Questions from Sen. Kennedy (submitted for
May 16, 2006 hearing). The federal government should not be
giving its seal of approval to practices that violate the
Constitution. Under this amendment, which forbids voting
changes motivated by ``any discriminatory purpose,'' it will
not do so.
During the hearings, witnesses echoed the explanation
provided by Pamela S. Karlan that ``[t]he amendment of section
5 to overturn the Supreme Court's interpretation in Bossier II
. . . only forbids states from making changes that would
themselves violate the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments.''
Testimony of Pamela S. Karlan, The Continuing Need for Section
5 Pre-Clearance, Hrg. before the Senate Judiciary Committee
(May 16, 2006) (emphasis added); accord Juan Catagena,
Responses to Written Questions from Sen. Schumer (submitted for
May 10, 2006 hearing). They testified that the language
encompasses voting practices that are ``taken with the purpose
of racial discrimination,'' that are ``intentionally
discriminatory,'' and that are ``purposefully taken . . . to
lock out racial and language minorities from political power.''
Testimony of Perales, supra; Anita Earls, Reponses to Written
Questions from Sen. Cornyn (submitted for May 16, 2006
hearing); Responses of Catagena, supra.
The language of the bill, ``discriminatory purpose,'' is
clear on its face. Voting practices adopted with a
``discriminatory purpose . . . do, of course, violate the
Constitution.'' Testimony of Pamela S. Karlan, supra. This is
familiar language. It is the language that the Supreme Court
uses in defining unconstitutional behavior under the Fourteenth
and Fifteenth Amendments. It is the language of cases such as
City of Mobile v. Bolden, 446 U.S. 55 (1980), and Washington v.
Davis, 426 U.S. 229 (1976).
The question of whether ``any discriminatory purpose''
provided protections equal to, or beyond, the Constitution was
fundamental at the hearings. Several witnesses had raised
concerns that expanding section 5 of the Voting Rights Act
might render section 5 unconstitutionally broad. Testimony of
Michael Carvin, Renewing the Temporary Provisions of the Voting
Rights Act: Legislative Options after LULAC v. Perry, Hrg.
before the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and
Property Rights of the Senate Judiciary Committee (July 13,
2006); Testimony of Abigail Thernstrom, Renewing the Temporary
Provisions of the Voting Rights Act: Legislative Options after
LULAC v. Perry, Hrg. before the Subcommittee on the
Constitution, Civil Rights, and Property Rights of the Senate
Judiciary Committee (July 13, 2006). Committee Members rejected
these concerns because witnesses who supported the bill, S.
2703, assured Members that the amendment ``causes no
constitutional difficulty whatsoever, since the amendment only
forbids states from making changes that would themselves
violate the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments.'' Testimony of
Karlan, supra; accord id. (``Amending section 5 to prohibit all
unconstitutional discrimination with respect to the right to
vote, rather than only the subset of unconstitutional
discrimination that is also retrogressive poses no
constitutional difficulties under any conceivable theory of
congressional power.'').
Another witness confirmed that adding the phrase ``any
discriminatory purpose'' posed no problems since it merely
reiterated the constitutional standard: ``[T]here can be no
constitutional difficulties in prohibiting under Section 5 all
unconstitutional discrimination touching upon the right to
vote--discrimination which would also violate the 14th and 15th
Amendments to the Constitution. Restoring Section 5
preclearance review to a pre-Reno [v. Bossier Parish] standard
would make Section 5 consistent with the prohibition in these
Constitutional amendments.'' Responses of Catagena, supra.
One traditional and important standard for identifying
unconstitutional racial discrimination is to ask whether the
challenged action departs from normal rules of decision. Courts
and the Justice Department should ask whether the decision not
to create a black-majority district departed from ordinary
districting rules. If a state has a large minority population
concentrated in a particular area, ordinary rules of
districting--following political and geographic borders and
keeping districts as compact as possible--would recommend that
those voters be given a majority-minority district. If the
State went out of its way to avoid creating such a majority-
minority--one that would be created under ordinary rules--that
is unconstitutional racial discrimination.
This amendment also has the effect of preventing the
recurrence of some Justice Department policies. For years, the
Justice Department required States to maximize majority-
minority districts at any cost. The result was bizarrely shaped
districts and maps gerrymandered beyond recognition, all on the
basis of race. The Supreme Court repeatedly ruled that this
policy violated the Constitution. See, e.g., Miller v. Johnson,
515 U.S. 900, 921 (1995); Bush v. Vera, 517 U.S. 952 (1996);
Hunt v. Cromartie, 526 U.S. 541 (1999). It is perverse to think
that, under the guise of enforcing voting rights, the Justice
Department was forcing States to violate citizens'
constitutional voting rights. This bill prevents future
incidences of such behavior by depriving the Justice Department
of the power to define for itself ``discriminatory purpose''
under the Voting Rights Act.
During the Senate hearings, some witnesses raised concerns
that the amendment could be misinterpreted, and that the
Justice Department or federal courts might compel the creation
of so-called influence or coalitional districts. The adopted
language does not prevent a state official from declining to
combine a group of minority voters with a group of white voters
who tend to support the same parties and candidates in a
district where candidates supported by minorities will reliably
prevail. Although such an action may make it more difficult for
that coalition of voters to elect their preferred candidate,
the Voting Rights Act is designed to ferret out and stop
unconstitutional discrimination on the basis of race or
ethnicity. It is not designed to protect political parties, or
to prevent statewide political realignments from being
reflected in the redistricting process. Nor can any racial or
political group claim a right under the Fourteenth or Fifteenth
Amendment to have its members placed as often as possible in
districts where candidates of the party favored by that group's
members will prevail. The ultimate goal of the Constitution's
Fourteenth Amendment is to ensure that persons of all races are
treated equally. Those implementing and applying the Voting
Rights Act must keep in mind that the Act is designed to
enforce the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments.
The language ``any discriminatory purpose'' does not permit
a finding of discriminatory purpose that is based, in whole or
part, on a failure to adopt the optimal or maximum number of
majority-minority districts or compact minority opportunity
districts. Nor does it permit a finding of discriminatory
purpose based on a determination that the plan seeks partisan
advantage or protects incumbents. The Constitution and the
courts already define racial discrimination and it is that
constitutional definition which we incorporate. Indeed, it
would raise serious constitutional questions if we were to
adopt a free-flowing definition of purpose--or authorized the
Justice Department to invent one--that is untethered from the
Constitution's commands or the Supreme Court's precedents. By
anchoring the language of section 5 in the Fourteenth and
Fifteenth Amendments, we limit Executive Branch discretion and
prevent future incidents of overreaching.
C. ``PREFERRED CANDIDATE OF CHOICE''
Another important aspect of the Voting Rights Act is the
protection afforded to minorities with respect to districting
plans established after each census. For over two decades, the
Supreme Court applied a workable standard when reviewing such
plans under section 5. The Court asked whether under the
proposed plan, ``the ability of minority groups . . . to elect
their choices to office is . . . diminished.'' Beer v. United
States, 425 U.S. 130, 141 (1976). In areas with racially
polarized voting, this was often equivalent to asking whether
the plan maintained naturally occurring majority-minority
districts.
In the 2003 case of Georgia v. Ashcroft, the Court replaced
this definition--that is, one that protects against
retrogression--with a totality of the circumstances approach.
The Court held that Section 5 permits states to replace
majority-minority districts in which minorities have the
ability to elect a candidate of choice with ``coalition'' or
``influence'' districts in which minorities have less voting
power.
Whatever the merits of such an approach, experts in the
area of voting rights have explained that the Georgia standard
is unworkable. The concept of ``influence'' is vague and the
concept of a ``coalition'' district is difficult to define.
Theodore M. Shaw, President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP
Legal Defense and Educational Fund, testified that he was
``skeptical that a workable standard of minority voters'
`influence' exists, or could be devised and implemented.''
Testimony of Theodore M. Shaw, Hrg. before the Subcommittee on
the Constitution of the House Judiciary Committee 25 (Nov. 9,
2005). And Mr. Shaw was not alone, as numerous witnesses who
testified before the House and Senate explained that the
Georgia standard is functionally unworkable. E.g., Testimony of
Robert Kengle, Hrg. before the Subcommittee on the Constitution
of the House Judiciary Committee 136 (Nov. 9, 2005); Testimony
of David T. Canon, Reauthorizing the Voting Rights Act's
Temporary Provisions: Policy Perspectives and Views from the
Field, Hrg. before the Senate Judiciary Committee (June 21,
2006); Appendix to Testimony of Nathaniel Persily, The
Continued Need for Section 5, Hrg. before Senate Judiciary
Committee (May 16, 2006).
The House witnesses were also unified in their conclusion
that Congress needed to adopt language in order to prevent the
substitution of coalition or influence districts for naturally
occurring majority-minority districts. Mr. Shaw testified,
``What Georgia v. Ashcroft does is open a door to cracking,
[or] dilution'' of majority-minority districts in order to
limit minorities' voting power. Testimony of Theodore M. Shaw,
supra, at 58. Attorney Anne Lewis explained that the purpose of
this language is to prevent elected officials from unpacking
majority-minority districts into ``influence'' or
``coalitional'' districts. Testimony of Anne W. Lewis, Hrg.
before the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House
Judiciary Committee 32 (Nov. 9, 2005); accord id. at 35.
Accordingly, S. 2703 specifically amends section 5 of the
Voting Rights Act to clarify that it protects the ability of
minority voters ``to elect their preferred candidates of
choice,'' and thus re-adopts--and clarifies further--the Beer
standard. The phrase ``preferred candidate of choice'' was
first proposed in the House hearings by Mr. Shaw, Ms. Lewis,
and Congressman Tyrone Brooks to solve this problem.
These witnesses made it clear that the new language did not
require the maximization or creation of majority-minority
districts. As one witness explained, the Supreme Court has held
``in Miller v. Johnson and Shaw v. Hunt that maximization of
minority voting strength is an improper reading of Section 5,''
Testimony of Kengle, supra, 139, and this bill does not change
that. Ms. Lewis explained that the language ``preferred
candidate of choice'' was not aimed at drawing ``bizarre
shape[d]'' majority-minority districts. Testimony of Anne W.
Lewis, supra, 34.
Instead, the language seeks to protect naturally occurring
majority-minority districts. Ms. Lewis explained that the goal
of the amendment was to prevent states from dismantling or
``refusing to draw naturally occurring geographically compact
majority-minority districts.'' Id. Mr. Shaw likewise stated
that the ``preferred candidate of choice'' language was
designed to prevent legislators from intentionally ``
`cracking' or `fragmenting' geographically compact minority
voting communities.'' Testimony of Shaw, supra, 24.
If covered jurisdictions are permitted to break up
districts where minorities form a clear majority of voters and
replace them with vague concepts such as influence, coalition,
and opportunity--a standard under which no one factor or
specific combination of factors is determinative--this may
actually facilitate racial discrimination against minority
voters.
Particularly disconcerting is the prospect that the Georgia
opinion potentially opens the door to increased substitution of
partisan interests for the ability of minorities to elect their
preferred candidate of choice. Several House witnesses
articulated the problem in clear terms: ``[To] the extent that
[we] can imagine what measures would be used to determine
whether substantive representation or influence has been
enhanced to prevent retrogression, these measures amount to
simply helping Democratic Party candidates . . . Helping
Democratic Party candidates would be argued to be equivalent to
increasing minority voter influence and helping minority
substantive representation. In other words, influence
districts, if seen as a replacement for opportunities for
minority voters to elect representatives of their choice, would
become simply a rationale for creating Democratic party
gerrymanders.'' Prepared Statement of Theodore S. Arrington,
Hrg. before the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House
Judiciary Committee 84 (Nov. 9, 2005).
However, as we learned from witnesses, this is not an
acceptable result. Congressman Brooks made this point when he
stated that ``. . . retrogression would be something I could
never accept. I would not ever sacrifice the full protections
of section 5 . . . simply to promote a particular candidate or
a political party. And I think that's basically what it came
down to in 2001 in Georgia. We were putting political decisions
ahead of what the Voting Rights Act really is all about, and I
think we made a mistake.'' Testimony of Rep. Tyrone Brooks,
Hrg. before the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House
Judiciary Committee 76 (Nov. 9, 2005). One House Member
commented that the Georgia legislature ``had made a partisan
decision to basically protect Democratic districts, or the
Democratic Party,'' and asked, ``do you believe that that's an
appropriate use of the Voting Rights Act?'' Rep. Brooks
responded, ``No, I do not,'' and urged the Committee to accept
the ``preferred candidate of choice'' language in order to
prevent this result in the future. Id. Congressman John Lewis,
in endorsing the amendment, stated, ``I cannot accept the
Court's conclusion that the interests of an incumbent minority
politician are the same as the interest of minority voters,
with respect to redistricting. There is a clear conflict
there.'' Prepared Statement of Congressman John Lewis, Hrg.
before the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House
Judiciary Committee 81 (Nov. 9, 2005).
In truth, witnesses made clear to the committee that the
``argument was that the Voting Rights Act was not intended to
protect the incumbents of any political party or, for that
matter, the incumbents of any particular race. Instead, the
purpose of the Voting Rights Act is to protect the rights of
voters in minority racial and language communities, who have
historically been denied the opportunity to elect candidates of
their choice.'' Testimony of Anne W. Lewis, supra, at 34.
The bill's proposed language codifies this understanding.
It eliminates any risk that the scenarios feared by Georgia v.
Ashcroft's critics will unfold. By focusing solely on the
protection of naturally occurring legislative districts with a
majority of minority voters, the reauthorization bill ensures
that minority voters will not be forced to trade away solidly
majority-minority districts for ambiguous concepts like
``influence'' or ``coalitional.'' Rather, as the House
Committee Report makes clear, the bill ``rejects'' the Supreme
Court's interpretation of section 5 in Georgia v. Ashcroft, and
establishes that the purpose of section 5's protection of
minority voters is, in the words of the bill, to ``protect the
ability of such citizens to elect their preferred candidates of
choice.''
It is important to emphasize that this language does not
protect any district with a representative who gets elected
with some minority votes. Rather, it protects only districts in
which ``such citizens''--minority citizens--are the ones
selecting their ``preferred candidate of choice'' with their
own voting power. These two phrases have a limited but
important purpose: protecting naturally occurring majority-
minority districts. By limiting non-retrogression requirements
to districts in which ``such [minority] citizens'' are able
with their own vote power to elect ``preferred'' candidates of
choice--not just a candidate of choice settled for when forced
to compromise with other groups--the bill limits section 5 to
protecting those naturally occurring, compact majority-minority
districts with which section 5 was originally concerned. This
approach would avoid what one minority witness called the ``
`cracking' of majority-minority districts.'' Testimony of
Persily, supra.
Among the salutary effects of the ``preferred candidate of
choice'' language is that it avoids several legal and practical
pitfalls. First, the bill would replace the ambiguous standard
set by the Supreme Court in Georgia v. Ashcroft with the
workable standard in Beer. This would promote the Act's
original purposes, provide predictability to all involved, and
reduce wasteful litigation. Additionally, the bill would not
lock into place coalition or influence districts, as this would
wreak havoc with the redistricting process and would stretch
the Voting Rights Act beyond the scope of Congress's authority
under the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments. Finally, the
amendment clarifies that the competitive position of a
political party is not the concern of the Voting Rights Act.
This legislation definitively is not intended to preserve or
ensure the successful election of candidates of any political
party, even if that party's candidates generally are supported
by members of minority groups. The Voting Rights Act was
intended to enhance voting power, not to serve as a one-way
ratchet in favor of partisan interests.
Naturally occurring majority-minority districts have long
been the historical focus of the Voting Rights Act. They are
the districts that would be created if legitimate, neutral
principles of drawing district boundaries, such as attention to
county and municipal political borders, were combined with the
existence of a large and compact minority population to draw a
district in which racial minorities form a majority. The
changes made by section 5 of this bill, overriding aspects of
Georgia v. Ashcroft, would give federal authorities the tools
they need to prevent state and local authorities from
arbitrarily refusing to create or arbitrarily dismantling such
districts, or from implementing other voting practices that are
motivated by racial or ethnic discrimination.
X. Additional Views of Mr. Kyl
I concur without reservation in the Chairman's report. I
write separately simply to add a few points with regard to the
VRARA's treatment of Reno v. Bossier Parish II, 528 U.S. 320
(2000), and Georgia v. Ashcroft, 539 U.S. 461 (2003).
As the Chairman notes, the VRARA's changes to Section 5 of
the Voting Rights Act ensure that the Act will protect the
creation and retention of naturally occurring districts with a
clear majority of minority voters--and nothing more. The
Chairman emphasizes that the Act as amended by the bill does
not protect coalitional or influence districts.
I write separately to explain why I believe that Congress
cannot require that state or local governments create or retain
influence or coalitional districts. These are districts that do
not have a majority of minority voters but that nevertheless
reliably support candidates and parties supported by minority
voters. I believe that extending the protections of Section 5
of the Voting Rights Act to these districts would exceed the
scope of Congress's power to enforce the Equal Protection
Clause pursuant to Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The ultimate goal of the Equal Protection Clause is to
ensure that different races are treated equally. Even if
influence or coalitional districts were properly understood to
protect the interests of minority voters, rather than the
interests of political parties--a matter that is of some
dispute--a mandate for the creation or retention of such
districts would not be a reasonable means of enforcing that
Clause. If the Voting Rights Act forced states to create such
districts whenever possible (or even only when permitted by
neutral redistricting criteria), or barred states from
disassembling such districts, Federal law effectively would
require that one group of voters be placed as often as possible
in districts where candidates and parties supported by that
group of voters will prevail.
Such a requirement would be problematic for several
reasons. First, it is the nature of politics and elections that
some voters will support a winning candidate and that some will
support a candidate who loses. It is no violation of a person's
voting rights that the candidate that he voted for lost. That
is simply how elections work. The Fourteenth and Fifteenth
Amendments protect a right to be able to vote free from the
influence of racial discrimination. They do not protect a right
to have one's candidate prevail in an election.
Moreover, in jurisdictions in which the protected group of
voters largely supports one party, a requirement that those
voters be placed in districts where their candidates and party
will prevail would introduce severe distortions into the
redistricting process. In effect, that jurisdiction would be
required to create and retain as many districts as possible
that would reliably elect candidates of the party favored by
the protected group of voters.
Such a mandate would be grossly unfair to voters who
support other parties that compete in the jurisdiction's
elections. A requirement that one group of voters be given
winning districts as often as possible also is a requirement
that other voters who support competing parties be placed in
losing districts. It is a mandate that effectively would
require affirmative discrimination against the aspirations of
other voters. Such a system would not be consistent with the
principle of the equal protection of the laws. It would not be
a reasonable means of enforcing the guarantees of the
Fourteenth Amendment.
Further, any application of Section 5 of the Voting Rights
Act that would have the effect of favoring one group of voters
above and at the expense of other voters would be in serious
tension with other parts of the Act. Statutes with integrated
provisions effecting a common general objective are read in
pari matera--that is, in such a way that one provision does not
negate or undercut another. Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act
bars the creation of a system under which members of one group
``have less opportunity than other members of the electorate to
participate in the political process and to elect
representatives of their choice.'' Obviously, if Section 5 were
applied in a way that required that one group of voters be
given opportunities superior to those enjoyed by other groups
to have its candidates prevail in elections, that section would
be inconsistent with Section 2. It would contravene Section 2's
prohibition on systems that give some groups ``less opportunity
than other members of the electorate * * * to elect
representatives of their choice.''
If the different parts of the Voting Rights Act are to be
construed in harmony, no part of that Act should be employed to
require implementation or retention of a particular voting
practice simply because it increases the competitive position
of a political party that is favored by a particular group of
voters. The Voting Rights Act does not require maximization or
enhancement of the electoral opportunities of any particular
group of voters--a result that could only be achieved at the
expense of the rights of other groups of voters. Indeed, such a
result would be at odds with the very constitutional provision
that the Act is designed to enforce, the Fourteenth Amendment,
which requires equal treatment of the rights and opportunities
of different groups of voters.
Finally, I would note that the operative assumptions
underlying the concepts of influence and coalitional districts
appear to be inconsistent with the predicates for Congress's
exercise of its powers under Section 5 of the Fourteenth
Amendment. Congress may legislate pursuant to Section 5 in
order to enact remedial legislation designed to combat
substantial and sustained racial discrimination. Because
Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act has been enacted and
extended pursuant to these Fourteenth Amendment powers, it must
be reasonably targeted at jurisdictions suspected of
discriminating against the aspirations of minority voters. In
reauthorizing Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, Congress
cannot presume the existence of the opposite of the predicates
for the exercise of its Fourteenth Amendment powers. The
preclearance requirement cannot be based on the assumption that
spreading out minority voters will have no negative impact on
their electoral aspirations because other groups will readily
support minority voters' preferred candidates. If such an
assumption were clearly accurate, there would be no basis for
legislating pursuant to Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment
in the first place. And if this or any future Congress were to
incorporate such assumptions into Section 5 of the Voting
Rights Act, it would cast doubt on the constitutionality of the
Act's mandate that covered states and localities preclear all
changes in their voting procedures with the Federal government.
With these considerations in mind, I concur in the
Committee's decision to report a bill that does not require
influence or coalitional districts, but that instead reaffirms
the Voting Rights Act's historical focus on protecting
naturally occurring majority-minority districts.
Jon Kyl.
XI. Additional Views of Mr. Cornyn and Mr. Coburn
We regret that these views will be filed post-enactment.
The expedited process prohibited normal order, but we believe
the following considerations should accompany the Act's
passage.
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is arguably the most
important and effective civil rights legislation ever enacted.
Indeed, when signing the landmark legislation into law, Lyndon
Johnson, the President of the United States and former member
of the Senate from the state of Texas, described the act's
passage as ``a triumph for freedom as huge as any victory that
has ever been won on any battlefield.'' \1\ President Johnson's
words captured the importance of the act's passage and
underscore that it was a hard-fought victory at a tense time in
American history.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Lyndon B.
Johnson, 1965. Volume II, entry 394, pp. 811-815. Washington, DC:
Government Printing Office, 1966.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is no secret why the Voting Rights Act was necessary. It
was adopted at the height of the civil rights movement, when
numerous jurisdictions throughout the United States had
actively engaged in the intentional, systematic
disenfranchisement of blacks and other minorities from the
electoral process. As the committee report and the extensive
record reflects, these jurisdictions engaged in the
discriminatory use of tests and devices such as literacy,
knowledge and moral character tests--tests specifically
designed to be failed. Even worse, violence and brutality were
commonplace. Blacks were beaten and killed simply for
attempting to exercise their right to participate in the
democratic process, and civil rights activists were thwarted at
every turn in their attempt to enact reform. This type of
bigotry and hatred at the polls, coupled with escalating
violence and the murder of activists, is the backdrop against
which the Voting Rights Act was adopted.
S. 2703, the legislation that has passed out of committee,
is another step in our nation's long road toward equal justice
under the law for all Americans. The legislation provides for
the reauthorization of the expiring provisions of the Voting
Rights Act--provisions that are designed to protect against
discrimination at the polls. For these reasons, and because we
believe that there are certain political subdivisions across
the nation that would further benefit from federal oversight,
we joined our colleagues in voting for this legislation.
However, we do hold some significant reservations about a
number of important issues. These concerns can generally be
categorized as follows: (1) the record of evidence does not
appear to reasonably underscore the decision to simply
reauthorize the existing Section 5 coverage formula--a formula
that is based on 33 to 41 year old data, and (2) the seemingly
rushed, somewhat incomplete legislative process involved in
passing the legislation prevented the full consideration of
numerous suggested improvements to the Act.
In short, while we support reauthorization generally, we
reluctantly conclude that the final product is not the best
product we might have produced had we engaged in a more
thorough debate about possible improvements. We also conclude
that it would have been beneficial if the Section 4 coverage
formula had been updated in order to adhere to constitutional
requirements--an update that would have preserved, strengthened
and expanded the Act to ensure its future success.
1. EVIDENCE IN THE RECORD CALLS FOR AN UPDATED COVERAGE FORMULA
The good news is that the Act fulfilled its promise. Today,
we live in a different--albeit still imperfect--world. Today,
no one can claim that the kind of systematic, invidious
practices that plagued our election systems 40 years ago still
exist in America. And the Act resulted in almost immediate,
measurable improvements with respect to covered jurisdictions.
However, simply reauthorizing the expiring provisions with the
existing coverage formula--based on 33 to 41 year old data--may
not have been the best approach given the evidence today in
2006.
Increased Voter Registration and Turnout Rates in Covered Jurisdictions
In 1965 when the Voting Rights Act was adopted the average
registration rate for black voters in the seven original
covered states was only 29.3 percent.\2\ Today, the voter
registration rate among blacks, for example, in covered
jurisdictions is over 68.1 percent of the population--higher
than the 62.2 percent found in non-covered jurisdictions.\3\ As
the chart below indicates, voter registration data since the
Act's original passage in 1965 shows that covered jurisdictions
have demonstrated equal or higher voter registration rates
among black voters as non-covered jurisdictions since the mid
1970's.\4\ Voter turnout data is equally encouraging, with 60
percent of black citizens casting votes in both covered
jurisdictions and non-covered jurisdictions.\5\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ Senate Report 162, at 44 (April 21, 1965).
\3\ 2004 Election Data from the U.S. Census Bureau. Reflects the
percentage as a percent of the population, as compared to as a percent
of the Citizen Voting Age Population. Those numbers are 69.9 percent
and 67.9 percent. In addition, certain assumptions were made to account
for partially covered jurisdictions--North Carolina and Virginia were
considered ``covered'' for this calculation because of their
significant number of covered counties.
\4\ Id.
\5\ Id.
Further, statistician Keith Gaddie reported registration of
black citizens in Alabama during the 2004 elections was 72.9%
of the voting age population,\6\ in Georgia, 64.2%,\7\ in
Louisiana, 71.1%,\8\ in Mississippi, 76.1%,\9\ in South
Carolina, 71.1%,\10\ and in Virginia, 57.4% of the voting age
population. Voter turnout rates were equally improved. For
example, in 2004 Alabama had a 63.9% turnout rate of registered
black voters,\11\ Georgia had a 54.4% turnout rate,\12\
Louisiana had a 62.1% turnout rate,\13\ Mississippi had a 66.8%
turnout rate,\14\ South Carolina had a 59.5% turnout rate,\15\
and Virginia had a 49.6% turnout rate.\16\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\6\ Understanding the Benefits and Costs of Section 5 Pre-
Clearance: Before the Senate Comm. on the Judiciary, 109th Cong. 5
(2006) (Submitted testimony by Professor Keith Gaddie on May 17, 2006:
The Bullock-Gaddie Voting Rights Studies: An Analysis of Section 5 of
the Voting Rights Act. See Table 2 on Alabama.)
\7\ Id. See Table 2 on Georgia.
\8\ Id. See Table 2 on Louisiana.
\9\ Id. See Table 1 on Mississippi.
\10\ Id. See Table 1 on South Carolina.
\11\ Id. See Table 3 on Alabama.
\12\ Id. See Table 3 on Georgia.
\13\ Id. See Table 3 on Louisiana.
\14\ Id. See Table 2 on Mississippi.
\15\ Id. See Table 2 on South Carolina.
\16\ Id. See Table 2 on Virginia.
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Declining Objections by the Department of Justice
Another important indicator of the success of the Act is
the continual decline of objections issued by the Department of
Justice to plans submitted under section 5 for pre-clearance.
The Supplemental Views submitted by the Chairman of the
Committee includes a chart depicting DOJ objections since 1982.
It is worth noting that both total objections and objections as
a percent of submissions have declined significantly over that
time, and as we understand, since the original passage of the
Act.
Our review of the data indicates that the continual decline
has occurred under both Republican and Democrat Presidential
administrations, dropping from 67 objections out of 2848 in
1982 to only 19 objections out of 3,999 submissions in 1995.
Perhaps most telling is the fact that in 2005, there was only 1
objection out of 3,811 pre-clearance submissions.\17\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\17\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
While some maintain that the analysis may be skewed since
Bossier v. Parrish II removed ``discriminatory purpose'' from
the equation, the fact is that the trend has been a declining
number of objections in covered jurisdictions over time. We
believe this is something to celebrate as an indication of the
success of the Act.
Anecdotal Accounts Submitted Implicate only a Portion of Covered
Political Subdivisions
The volume of testimony and submissions amassed during the
House and Senate hearings was overwhelming. Indeed, when the
Senate Judiciary Committee held its first hearing, the House
Judiciary Committee Chairman said, ``I am here today to present
this Committee with the results of our examination, which
includes almost 8,000 pages of testimony that comprise 9 of the
10 hearing records compiled by the House Judiciary Committee.''
Our understanding is that ultimately the Senate received almost
10,000 pages from the House of Representatives.
Numerous witnesses suggested that the primary rationale for
continued coverage based on the existing formula was over
10,000 pages of accounts of discrimination compiled. Senate
Judiciary staff analyzed the report during the course of
hearings seeking to find all accounts of discrimination alleged
in the report. The result of that effort--a 283 page summary of
examples of discrimination--is included as Appendix 3 to the
Committee Report.
While we take no position on the existence of
discrimination alleged in the accounts in the record, at face
value the anecdotes submitted implicate only a fraction of the
total number of covered political subdivisions.\18\ For
example, of the 254 counties in Texas, only 22 are implicated
by the accounts of discrimination submitted in the record. This
analysis admittedly excludes any accounts of statewide
discrimination (e.g. a redistricting plan)--because including
such examples are indicative of the state policy not the local
political subdivision.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\18\ It was not possible for our staffs to investigate and verify
each and every account of discrimination submitted.
COUNTIES SPECIFICALLY IMPLICATED IN HOUSE AND SENATE RECORD ACCOUNTS OF DISCRIMINATION \19\
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Percentage of
Number of Total Number Counties
State Counties of Counties in Implicated
Implicated the State (Percent)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alabama......................................................... 13 67 19.40
Alaska.......................................................... 5 27 18.52
Arizona......................................................... 6 15 40.00
California...................................................... 10 58 17.24
Colorado........................................................ 2 64 3.13
Florida......................................................... 5 67 7.46
Georgia......................................................... 27 159 16.98
Illinois........................................................ 8 102 7.84
Indiana......................................................... 1 92 1.09
Kentucky........................................................ 3 120 2.50
Louisiana....................................................... 2 64 3.13
Maryland........................................................ 1 23 4.35
Massachusetts................................................... 2 14 14.29
Michigan........................................................ 5 83 6.02
Minnesota....................................................... 2 87 2.30
Mississippi..................................................... 8 82 9.76
Missouri........................................................ 1 114 0.88
Montana......................................................... 6 56 10.71
New Jersey...................................................... 5 21 23.81
New Mexico...................................................... 3 33 9.09
New York........................................................ 8 62 12.90
North Carolina.................................................. 15 100 15.00
Ohio............................................................ 2 88 2.27
Pennsylvania.................................................... 3 67 4.48
Rhode Island.................................................... 1 5 20.00
South Carolina.................................................. 23 46 50.00
South Dakota.................................................... 14 66 21.21
Texas........................................................... 22 254 8.66
Virginia........................................................ 14 134 10.45
Washington...................................................... 1 39 2.56
Wisconsin....................................................... 3 72 4.17
Wyoming......................................................... 1 23 4.35
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
\19\ Data collected from a review of the record by Senate Judiciary Committee staff.
COUNTIES SPECIFICALLY IMPLICATED IN PARTIALLY COVERED JURISDICTIONS
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Percentage of
Covered Preclearance
State Counties Preclearance Counties
Implicated Counties Implicated
(Percent)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
California...................................................... 3 4 75
Florida......................................................... 0 5 0
Michigan........................................................ 2 2 100
New York........................................................ 3 3 100
North Carolina.................................................. 9 40 22.5
South Dakota.................................................... 2 2 100
Virginia........................................................ 14 123 11.38
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Interestingly, while Florida has 5 counties that are
subject to Section 5 coverage, none of these counties were
implicated by the accounts of discrimination. Yet there were 5
non-covered counties in Florida that were pointed out in the
list of accounts. If reauthorization of Section 5 coverage is
based on the accounts in the record, it does not seem that the
coverage formula in Florida as re-authorized could possibly be
appropriate.
In the Senate Judiciary Committee mark-up, Senator Durbin
argued in favor of reauthorization by stating that, ``[w]e have
gathered thousands of pages of reports and evidence.'' \20\
While there are, in fact, thousands of pages in the record--it
is important to clarify that there are a limited number of
examples of discrimination and that the examples offered do not
implicate the majority of covered political subdivisions. In
all, of 893 covered counties, 139 are directly implicated in
the accounts of discrimination scattered throughout those
``thousands of pages.''
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\20\ Unofficial Transcript: Special Executive Business Meeting to
Consider S. 2703, Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, and Coretta Scott King
Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006: Senate
Committee on Judiciary, 109th Cong. 19 (2006) (Oral statement of
Senator Dick Durbin on July 19, 2006).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is no question that if those accounts are accurate,
that those 139 counties are deserving of coverage under Section
5, and possibly numerous others upon review. That is precisely
the reason we voted for this legislation. But it would have
been advisable for the committee or the Senate as a whole to
consider an updated coverage formula to ensure that the
appropriate jurisdictions were covered according to
constitutional requirements. That kind of deliberative process
simply was not allowed to occur.
It strikes us that much of this is great news. Increased
voter registration rates for African American voters in covered
jurisdictions, reduced numbers of objections sustained,
increased numbers of minority elected officials, fewer counties
implicated with discriminatory activity, and generally a
decreasing distinction, if any, between covered jurisdictions
and non-covered jurisdictions means that there is strong and
compelling evidence that, in fact, the Voting Rights Act has
largely achieved the purposes that Congress had hoped for and
that millions of people who had previously been disenfranchised
had prayed for.
In light of this strong indication that the act has largely
achieved the purposes that Congress had intended, of course,
the logical question before us was whether these provisions
under section 5 should have been reauthorized.
2. THE LEGISLATIVE PROCESS FAILED TO PRODUCE THOROUGH DELIBERATION
Misunderstood Timing and Nature of Re-Authorization
From the beginning of the reauthorization process, two
critical facts were repeatedly ignored or misunderstood: (1)
that the Voting Rights Act is, in fact, permanent and only
certain temporary provisions are set to expire; and (2) that
the expiring provisions were not set to expire until the summer
of 2007--and thus there was plenty of time to work on improving
the Act.
The misunderstanding about the permanence of the Voting
Rights Act--particularly by the press--is perhaps most
troubling. In truth, the act's core provision, section 2,
prohibits the denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen
to vote on account of race or color, is permanent, and applies
nationwide. That provision will never expire, and it is not
affected by the reauthorization language we review today.
This is an important distinction because it caused a great
deal of confusion in the public. In fact, according to the
Department of Justice, the agency ``received numerous inquiries
concerning a rumor that [was] intermittently circulating around
the nation . . . According to this rumor, the Voting Rights Act
will expire in 2007, and as a result African Americans are in
danger of losing the right to vote in that year.'' \21\ In
truth, as the DOJ points out, ``[t]he voting rights of African
Americans are guaranteed by the United States Constitution and
the Voting Rights Act, and those guarantees are permanent and
do not expire.'' \22\ Instead, we are addressing (a) temporary
provisions that were originally set to expire in 5 years, and
that were adopted to subject certain jurisdictions to Federal
oversight of the voting laws and procedures until the intent of
the Voting Rights Act was accomplished, as well (b) certain
temporary, later-added provisions designed to protect voters
from discrimination based upon limited English proficiency.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\21\ www.usdoj.gov, U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights
Division Voting Section, Voting Rights Act Clarification.
\22\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
We believe that this misunderstanding about the nature and
timing of the expiration of certain provisions of the Voting
Rights Act contributed to an unnecessarily heightened political
environment that prohibited the Senate from conducting the kind
of thorough debate that would have produced a superior product.
Expedited Process Reduced Focus on the Issue
Chairman Specter readily ceded to requests that were made
to try to create a complete record. The Chairman worked hard to
hold a sufficient number of fair and balanced hearings, but
given our busy schedule on the Senate floor, it was not always
easy for Members to attend and participate. An artificial rush
to move the House version of the Voting Rights Act through the
Senate on an expedited basis began more than a full year prior
to the earliest expiration of any provisions of the Act.
The Senate Judiciary Committee held nine hearings with a
total of forty-six witnesses. Eight of those hearings were held
in nine work weeks--and during times when many Committee
members had other obligations. Indeed, four hearings were held
during a substantial floor debate on the issue of immigration--
legislation that directly involved most Judiciary Committee
members in one way or another. Two hearings were interrupted by
roll-call votes on the floor.
The timing of our hearings and the expedited nature of the
process was prohibitive to Senators who otherwise would have
participated. Member attendance at these hearings was low.
Indeed, at each of the first two hearings on Section 5, only
one Senator was able to attend. Five Committee Members were
unable to attend any of the hearings, while five others
attended only a portion of one hearing. This is not meant as
criticism to the Members that were unable to attend--indeed we
unfortunately missed a number of hearings. Rather, it is meant
to shed light on the process, a process that prohibited the
kind of engaged discussion we would have preferred.
The only way many Senators could ask thoughtful questions
of witnesses at the hearings was through written questions, and
many were submitted. In fact, Senators submitted a total of 610
follow-up questions. Unfortunately, however, when the Senate
marked up the legislation, we were told that 107 written
questions to 10 witnesses were outstanding. Further, questions
had not yet even been submitted for the final hearing--a
hearing we had held just one week prior regarding the important
issue of how the Supreme Court's decision in LULAC v. Perry may
have influenced our legislation.
Suggested Improvements Not Considered
Over the course of the many hearings we held, we heard from
a variety of witnesses--from across the political spectrum and
across racial lines. Many witnesses, from all sides of the
debate, suggested improvements to the Act.
For example, Loyola law professor Rick Hasen suggested in
his testimony before the committee several specific ways to
amend the Act. For example, he suggested that ``Congress should
make it easier for covered jurisdictions to bail out from
coverage under Section 5 upon a showing that the jurisdiction
has taken steps to fully enfranchise and include minority
voters,'' and that Congress should impose a shorter time limit,
perhaps 7 to 10 years for extension. The bill includes a 25-
year extension, and the Court may believe it is beyond
``congruent and proportional'' to require, for example, the
State of South Carolina to pre-clear every voting change, no
matter how minor, through 2031.'' \23\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\23\ Unofficial Transcript: An Introduction to the Expiring
Provisions of the Voting Rights Act and Legal Issues Relating to
Reauthorization: Before the Senate Comm. on the Judiciary, 109th Cong.
25 (2006).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Similarly, Samuel Issacharoff, Professor of Constitutional
Law at the New York University School of Law, suggested five
ways to improve the Act during his oral testimony:
First, I would recommend that the unit of coverage be
moved from the States to political subdivisions of the
States . . . Second, I think that is important, as
Professor Hasen said a minute ago, to liberalize the
bailout provisions . . . Third, I think that if we were
to start from scratch today, we might consider a
different kind of administrative mechanism other than
the preclearance, and one way of thinking about this is
that preclearance is extremely onerous and applies an
ex ante and ahead-of-time review much like the FDA to
any proposed change. One could also imagine a
Securities and Exchange Commission type reporting
system that covered jurisdictions who have not actively
violated the Act in the last 5 years, or some defined
period, would be required to post on a website any
proposed change and the reasons for it and be subject
to either affirmative litigation under Section 2 or
simply a false statement litigation . . . Fourth, I
would expand the jurisdictional reach of Section 5 by
allowing this disclosure regime to be applied to any
jurisdiction that has been found guilty of a Section 2
violation or that has engaged in affirmative actions
against minority voters. And, finally, I think that
there is reason for concern with the language on the
overruling of Georgia v. Ashcroft, and I think that the
reason for the concern is that the current statute
faces a climate very different from that in 1965 in
that you have real bipartisan competition in most of
the covered jurisdictions today, which means that
certain features of conduct, State conduct, will not go
by unattended, will not simply pass muster without
anybody realizing. And I would recommend removing
statewide redistricting from Section 5 overview
altogether. That has been an area of some controversy
with the Department of Justice, and it has been an area
where there is plenty of litigation in every
redistricting anyway, and I don't think Section 5
worked particularly effectively there.\24\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\24\ Unofficial Transcript: An Introduction to the Expiring
Provisions of the Voting Rights Act and Legal Issues Relating to
Reauthorization: Before the Senate Comm. on the Judiciary, 109th Cong.
37 (2006).
We believe it would have been beneficial for the long-term
viability, constitutionality and success of the Voting Rights
Act had for the Senate Judiciary Committee to engage in a
serious, reasoned debate over some of these suggested possible
improvements as well as any other ideas. These improvements
would underscore the Act's original purpose, and would
modernize it to reflect today's reality. They would possibly
expand the coverage of section 5 to jurisdictions where recent
abuses have taken place or, perhaps, have improved the so-
called bailout procedures for those jurisdictions that had a
successful record of remedying, indeed eliminating
discrimination when it comes to voting rights.
One idea that was offered was to update the coverage
formula. We don't know if that is a good idea or not, but we
would like to know. Some suggest that such an update would
``gut'' or otherwise undercut the effectiveness of the Act--
something that certainly would not be our intention. But we are
skeptical that this would be the result. The amendment that was
voted on in the House, for example, would have updated the
coverage trigger to the most recent three Presidential
elections from the current trigger of the 1964, 1968, and 1972
elections.
As we understand it, coverage, after an update to cover the
most recent three Presidential elections, would look something
like the chart included at the end of our views, entitled
``Effect of Basing Section Coverage on Recent Election Data.''
This chart reflects the effect of implementing a new coverage
formula. In other words, rather than basing coverage on
election data that is several decades old, where nine states
are completely covered and a handful of other political
subdivisions around the country are covered, one would see
coverage of different jurisdictions around the country based on
the updated formula. The intent would be to reflect the
problems where they really exist and where the record
demonstrates some justification for the assertion of Federal
power and intrusion into the local and State electoral
processes.
If this map is an accurate reflection of the effects of
updating the trigger to the most recent three Presidential
elections, it certainly changes the coverage. But we would
suggest, just looking at the jurisdictions on the map, it
hardly guts it. Another alternative might have been to use the
very evidence provided in the House and Senate record--as
discussed above--that implicates 139 of the currently covered
counties as well as 45 of the non-covered counties throughout
the nation.
The primary point is not that any of these methods is
necessarily the right approach, but that it would have been
beneficial for us to have had a full discussion of ways to
improve the Act to ensure its important provisions were
narrowly tailored and applied in a congruent and proportional
way, something the Supreme Court will take into consideration
when it considers the renewed Act. We believe we could have
done it had we taken the time to do it.
Legislative Language Seemingly a Foregone Conclusion
Probably our most significant concern is that this
important legislation was--unfortunately--a bit of a foregone
conclusion. As we described above, the hearings held in the
Senate were quite informative. There were numerous
perspectives--numerous ideas offered on how to improve the Act
from witnesses across the ideological and racial spectrum and
those both supportive of the reauthorization and concerned with
the reauthorization.
From the outset, the default seemed to be to accept the
House product without deliberation. In fact, the findings in
the Senate-dropped version of the bill were adopted PRIOR to a
single hearing being held in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Despite the fact that each hearing had a very balanced panel
and many amendment ideas were offered by witnesses, it was
clear that no amendment would be given serious consideration
because of the political nature of the bill and the expedited,
rushed process. As described earlier in our views, the
Committee marked up the legislation with 107 written questions
to 10 witnesses outstanding, as well as before questions were
even submitted to our final panel. Unfortunately, we proceeded
without the benefit of a complete record despite the fact that
we had plenty of time to receive the answers from witnesses and
fully consider their implications and input.
And the questions that Senators asked revealed that they
were interested in at least considering amendments. Many
Senators asked which amendments to consider and how to properly
draft such amendments. However, when the House of
Representatives passed H.R. 9, their version of the Voting
Rights Act, without any amendments on July 13, 2006, it became
clear that the Senate would pass a bill without any amendments.
If there had been any doubt prior, the text of the bill became
a foregone conclusion for the Senate after House passage.
The process that led to a vote on the floor reveals that
not a single change was permitted to be made to the legislation
passed in the Senate. While the Committee approved by voice
vote an amendment offered by Senator Leahy to incorporate Mr.
Cesar Chavez's name into the title of the Act, it became clear
that the Committee would not accept any amendments that changed
the substance of the bill, including the amendments circulated
by Senator Coburn. In fact, Senators expressed concern about
any amendments that would slow the expedited passage of the
Act. The Judiciary Committee reported out the Senate's version
of the Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King and
Caesar Chavez Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments
Act of 2006, S. 2703, without substantive amendment.
Yet, Majority Leader Frist had already used Rule 14 of
Senate procedure to place H.R. 9 on the calendar, and we were
told that it was the House legislation would be called up for a
full vote on the Senate floor the following afternoon. The
rules adopted for floor debate allowed for eight hours of
discussion evenly divided by the Republicans and Democrats and
ruled out the ability to offer amendments on the floor. The
process prevented any amendments on the floor so that the same
Act that the House of Representatives approved would pass the
Senate and there would be no conference. While a Member may
have been able to object and require a vote on an amendment,
the outcome was a foregone conclusion, and thus it would have
been futile.
Finally, even the production of this committee report--
something that normally is of the utmost significance for such
important, complicated legislation--has been short circuited.
Indeed, the report will not be filed until several days after
the passage of the legislation and just before it is signed
into law. We remain convinced that these views are critical to
a full understanding of the legislative process behind
enactment and thus include them in the Committee Report.
CONCLUSION
We decided to support the extension of the expiring
changes, even though it would have been preferable and even
constitutionally advisable for us to review the application of
the Act's pre-clearance and other provisions. Unfortunately,
the Act's language was a foregone conclusion, and we were
unable to have the kind of debate and discussion and perhaps
amendment process that might have been helpful to protect the
act against future legal challenges. We wish we would have had
the opportunity to improve the Act--because we are confident
that with a little work, we could have done just that.
We cannot help but fear that the driving force behind this
rushed reauthorization process was the reality that the Voting
Rights Act has evolved into a tool for political and racial
gerrymandering. We believe that is unfortunate and that
political re-districting should be driven by objective
parameters and should not use race to further the objectives of
political parties.
Nonetheless, we voted for reauthorization because of the
unparalleled success of the Voting Rights Act in the past in
securing the opportunity to vote. Few issues are as fundamental
to our system of democracy and the promise of equal justice
under law as the Voting Rights Act. The Act was specifically
designed to ``foster our transformation to a society that is no
longer fixated on race,'' to an ``all-inclusive community,
where we would be able to forget about race and color and see
people as people, as human beings, just as citizens.'' \25\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\25\ Georgia v. Ashcroft, 539 U.S. 461, 490 (2003).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is our sincere hope that we will move beyond
distinctions based on race in our policymaking, lest we, in the
words of Justice Anthony Kennedy, make ``the offensive and
demeaning assumption that voters of a particular race, because
of their race, think alike, share the same political interests,
and will prefer the same candidates at the polls.''
The question in the end is this: Is this bill that we have
passed the very best possible product? We would conclude that
it is not. Yet, in response to the question: Is this the very
best that we can do under the circumstances?'' We reluctantly
conclude that it is. And that is why we supported it in
Committee and on the floor.
Effect of Basing Section Coverage on Recent Election Data
The table below reflects the results we believe would occur
from updating the Section 4 coverage formula to 2000 and 2004
Presidential Election data from the current formula based on
the 1964, 1968 and 1972 election years. The original figure to
be included in this Committee Report was a map depicting the
counties covered. The purpose of the map was to demonstrate the
significant coverage that would be retained in currently
covered jurisdictions as well as the fact coverage would be
expanded. However, GPO is unable to print such a map into the
record, so in its place we have included the following table.
As pointed out in the additional views, we do not suggest that
this coverage formula is the best or preferred formula, but
that it would have been a reasonable alternative and should
have been given appropriate consideration in the Senate.
John Cornyn.
Tom Coburn.
VOTER TURNOUT DATA REPRESENTS THE PERCENTAGE OF THE CITIZEN VOTING AGE
POPULATION
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2004 2000
State County 2004 Coverage 2000 Coverage Turnout Turnout Count
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AL............ Barbour County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.72% 1
AL............ Bibb County......... Y................. Y................. 47.28% 45.89% 1
AL............ Blount County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.68% 1
AL............ Butler County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.92% 1
AL............ Calhoun County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.78% 1
AL............ Chambers County..... Y................. Y................. 48.85% 43.19% 1
AL............ Cherokee County..... Y................. Y................. 47.50% 42.12% 1
AL............ Cleburne County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.83% 1
AL............ Coffee County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.67% 1
AL............ Coosa County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.18% 1
AL............ Covington County.... .................. Y................. .......... 47.46% 1
AL............ Crenshaw County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.62% 1
AL............ Dale County......... .................. Y................. .......... 44.70% 1
AL............ DeKalb County....... Y................. Y................. 49.04% 43.39% 1
AL............ Elmore County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.84% 1
AL............ Escambia County..... Y................. Y................. 42.96% 40.16% 1
AL............ Franklin County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.57% 1
AL............ Geneva County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.99% 1
AL............ Houston County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.21% 1
AL............ Jackson County...... Y................. Y................. 49.39% 43.93% 1
AL............ Lauderdale County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.77% 1
AL............ Lawrence County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.20% 1
AL............ Lee County.......... Y................. Y................. 47.95% 44.22% 1
AL............ Limestone County.... .................. Y................. .......... 48.46% 1
AL............ Macon County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.61% 1
AL............ Marion County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.73% 1
AL............ Marshall County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.87% 1
AL............ Mobile County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.96% 1
AL............ Montgomery County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.98% 1
AL............ Pike County......... .................. Y................. .......... 47.90% 1
AL............ Randolph County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.56% 1
AL............ Russell County...... Y................. Y................. 46.98% 40.89% 1
AL............ Talladega County.... .................. Y................. .......... 42.43% 1
AL............ Tuscaloosa County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.38% 1
AL............ Walker County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.64% 1
AL............ Winston County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.61% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AL Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 36
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AR............ Arkansas County..... Y................. Y................. 46.76% 41.02% 1
AR............ Ashley County....... Y................. Y................. 49.75% 47.46% 1
AR............ Bradley County...... Y................. Y................. 46.06% 42.74% 1
AR............ Chicot County....... Y................. Y................. 49.23% 44.12% 1
AR............ Clark County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.75% 1
AR............ Clay County......... Y................. Y................. 47.25% 43.59% 1
AR............ Columbia County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.89% 1
AR............ Conway County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.16% 1
AR............ Craighead County.... Y................. Y................. 46.57% 41.05% 1
AR............ Crawford County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.90% 1
AR............ Crittenden County... Y................. Y................. 43.51% 38.14% 1
AR............ Cross County........ .................. Y................. .......... 44.39% 1
AR............ Dallas County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.27% 1
AR............ Desha County........ Y................. Y................. 44.82% 41.86% 1
AR............ Drew County......... Y................. Y................. 45.31% 43.15% 1
AR............ Faulkner County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.22% 1
AR............ Franklin County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.02% 1
AR............ Fulton County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.84% 1
AR............ Grant County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.62% 1
AR............ Greene County....... Y................. Y................. 47.95% 44.73% 1
AR............ Hempstead County.... Y................. Y................. 45.43% 44.84% 1
AR............ Hot Spring County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.56% 1
AR............ Howard County....... Y................. Y................. 47.05% 44.14% 1
AR............ Independence County. Y................. Y................. 49.39% 45.40% 1
AR............ Izard County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.17% 1
AR............ Jackson County...... Y................. Y................. 46.82% 42.59% 1
AR............ Jefferson County.... .................. Y................. .......... 44.03% 1
AR............ Johnson County...... Y................. Y................. 46.35% 43.69% 1
AR............ Lawrence County..... Y................. Y................. 49.49% 44.84% 1
AR............ Lee County.......... Y................. Y................. 47.66% 44.49% 1
AR............ Lincoln County...... Y................. Y................. 36.20% 31.56% 1
AR............ Logan County........ Y................. Y................. 49.36% 48.83% 1
AR............ Lonoke County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.16% 1
AR............ Marion County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.15% 1
AR............ Miller County....... Y................. Y................. 46.76% 46.62% 1
AR............ Mississippi County.. Y................. Y................. 42.71% 34.69% 1
AR............ Monroe County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.95% 1
AR............ Nevada County....... Y................. .................. 48.18% .......... 1
AR............ Ouachita County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.98% 1
AR............ Pike County......... Y................. Y................. 40.98% 47.76% 1
AR............ Poinsett County..... Y................. Y................. 41.17% 38.37% 1
AR............ Polk County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.54% 1
AR............ Pope County......... .................. Y................. .......... 46.10% 1
AR............ Prairie County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.43% 1
AR............ Pulaski County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.01% 1
AR............ Randolph County..... Y................. Y................. 48.35% 43.01% 1
AR............ Sebastian County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.84% 1
AR............ Sevier County....... Y................. Y................. 44.53% 42.37% 1
AR............ St. Francis County.. Y................. Y................. 47.22% 40.24% 1
AR............ Union County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.60% 1
AR............ Washington County... .................. Y................. .......... 46.54% 1
AR............ White County........ Y................. Y................. 49.46% 44.14% 1
AR............ Woodruff County..... .................. Y................. .......... 41.08% 1
AR............ Yell County......... Y................. Y................. 45.83% 45.81% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AR Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 54
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AZ............ Apache County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.83% 1
AZ............ Cochise County...... .................. Y................. .......... 41.16% 1
AZ............ Gila County......... .................. Y................. .......... 47.14% 1
AZ............ Graham County....... Y................. Y................. 46.10% 41.95% 1
AZ............ La Paz County....... Y................. Y................. 35.06% 31.15% 1
AZ............ Maricopa County..... .................. Y................. .......... 45.44% 1
AZ............ Mohave County....... Y................. Y................. 43.73% 38.45% 1
AZ............ Navajo County....... Y................. Y................. 45.43% 40.53% 1
AZ............ Pima County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.14% 1
AZ............ Pinal County........ Y................. Y................. 43.18% 33.02% 1
AZ............ Santa Cruz County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.26% 1
AZ............ Yuma County......... Y................. Y................. 39.49% 31.71% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AZ Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 12
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CA............ Del Norte County.... Y................. Y................. 44.04% 42.00% 1
CA............ Fresno County....... Y................. Y................. 49.16% 49.48% 1
CA............ Imperial County..... Y................. Y................. 41.45% 38.87% 1
CA............ Kern County......... Y................. Y................. 47.46% 47.29% 1
CA............ Kings County........ Y................. Y................. 35.32% 35.48% 1
CA............ Lake County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.10% 1
CA............ Lassen County....... Y................. Y................. 41.28% 40.42% 1
CA............ Madera County....... Y................. Y................. 46.71% 46.70% 1
CA............ Merced County....... Y................. Y................. 44.26% 45.88% 1
CA............ Mono County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.77% 1
CA............ Riverside County.... Y................. Y................. 47.72% 49.10% 1
CA............ San Bernardino Y................. Y................. 45.37% 45.98% 1
County.
CA............ San Joaquin County.. Y................. .................. 47.66% .......... 1
CA............ Stanislaus County... Y................. Y................. 46.90% 48.27% 1
CA............ Tulare County....... Y................. Y................. 45.20% 46.36% 1
CA............ Yuba County......... Y................. Y................. 43.89% 43.20% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CA Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 16
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CO............ Adams County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.35% 1
CO............ Bent County......... .................. Y................. .......... 44.59% 1
CO............ Crowley County...... Y................. Y................. 33.01% 32.40% 1
CO............ Fremont County...... Y................. Y................. 48.31% 44.17% 1
CO............ Lincoln County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.92% 1
CO............ Prowers County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.47% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CO Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 6
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FL............ Bradford County..... Y................. Y................. 49.13% 42.76% 1
FL............ Columbia County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.34% 1
FL............ DeSoto County....... Y................. Y................. 43.05% 38.45% 1
FL............ Dixie County........ .................. Y................. .......... 43.80% 1
FL............ Duval County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.87% 1
FL............ Gadsden County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.07% 1
FL............ Glades County....... Y................. Y................. 47.96% 42.97% 1
FL............ Hamilton County..... Y................. Y................. 46.82% 39.61% 1
FL............ Hardee County....... Y................. Y................. 43.26% 38.26% 1
FL............ Hendry County....... Y................. Y................. 48.82% 41.64% 1
FL............ Jackson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.24% 1
FL............ Lafayette County.... .................. Y................. .......... 47.94% 1
FL............ Levy County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.08% 1
FL............ Liberty County...... .................. Y................. .......... 44.60% 1
FL............ Madison County...... .................. Y................. .......... 44.81% 1
FL............ Okeechobee County... Y................. Y................. 47.52% 40.71% 1
FL............ Orange County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.18% 1
FL............ Osceola County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.91% 1
FL............ Polk County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.48% 1
FL............ Suwannee County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.85% 1
FL............ Taylor County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.19% 1
FL............ Union County........ Y................. Y................. 42.72% 37.01% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FL Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 22
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
GA............ Appling County...... Y................. Y................. 49.41% 49.71% 1
GA............ Atkinson County..... Y................. Y................. 48.63% 44.05% 1
GA............ Bacon County........ .................. Y................. .......... 40.47% 1
GA............ Baldwin County...... Y................. Y................. 41.43% 35.06% 1
GA............ Banks County........ Y................. Y................. 48.02% 43.31% 1
GA............ Barrow County....... Y................. Y................. 44.57% 37.44% 1
GA............ Bartow County....... Y................. Y................. 48.54% 42.41% 1
GA............ Ben Hill County..... Y................. Y................. 46.36% 37.95% 1
GA............ Berrien County...... Y................. Y................. 45.88% 37.71% 1
GA............ Bibb County......... .................. Y................. .......... 44.59% 1
GA............ Bleckley County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.25% 1
GA............ Brantley County..... Y................. Y................. 49.08% 43.89% 1
GA............ Brooks County....... Y................. Y................. 43.08% 38.55% 1
GA............ Bryan County........ .................. Y................. .......... 44.52% 1
GA............ Bulloch County...... Y................. Y................. 41.34% 34.72% 1
GA............ Burke County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.82% 1
GA............ Butts County........ Y................. Y................. 44.42% 38.15% 1
GA............ Calhoun County...... Y................. Y................. 45.13% 38.59% 1
GA............ Camden County....... Y................. Y................. 45.60% 34.46% 1
GA............ Candler County...... Y................. Y................. 44.08% 41.13% 1
GA............ Carroll County...... Y................. Y................. 46.90% 40.84% 1
GA............ Catoosa County...... Y................. Y................. 49.86% 45.38% 1
GA............ Charlton County..... Y................. Y................. 41.97% 37.99% 1
GA............ Chatham County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.18% 1
GA............ Chattahoochee County Y................. Y................. 11.82% 11.80% 1
GA............ Chattooga County.... Y................. Y................. 38.54% 33.57% 1
GA............ Clarke County....... Y................. Y................. 46.61% 37.24% 1
GA............ Clayton County...... Y................. Y................. 46.99% 40.83% 1
GA............ Clinch County....... Y................. Y................. 45.62% 39.22% 1
GA............ Coffee County....... Y................. Y................. 45.70% 36.71% 1
GA............ Colquitt County..... Y................. Y................. 39.61% 34.90% 1
GA............ Cook County......... Y................. Y................. 42.45% 35.72% 1
GA............ Crawford County..... Y................. Y................. 47.19% 39.46% 1
GA............ Crisp County........ Y................. Y................. 40.98% 36.66% 1
GA............ Dade County......... .................. Y................. .......... 44.16% 1
GA............ Dawson County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.77% 1
GA............ Decatur County...... Y................. Y................. 44.48% 38.73% 1
GA............ Dodge County........ Y................. Y................. 48.40% 41.83% 1
GA............ Dooly County........ Y................. Y................. 45.03% 41.63% 1
GA............ Dougherty County.... Y................. Y................. 49.46% 42.33% 1
GA............ Douglas County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.67% 1
GA............ Early County........ Y................. Y................. 47.81% 40.91% 1
GA............ Echols County....... Y................. Y................. 36.83% 39.65% 1
GA............ Effingham County.... Y................. Y................. 49.87% 40.85% 1
GA............ Elbert County....... Y................. Y................. 49.93% 39.09% 1
GA............ Emanuel County...... Y................. Y................. 47.97% 41.14% 1
GA............ Evans County........ Y................. Y................. 42.86% 42.31% 1
GA............ Floyd County........ Y................. Y................. 46.54% 40.95% 1
GA............ Franklin County..... Y................. Y................. 45.89% 37.67% 1
GA............ Fulton County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.36% 1
GA............ Gilmer County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.03% 1
GA............ Glynn County........ .................. Y................. .......... 45.42% 1
GA............ Gordon County....... Y................. Y................. 46.20% 39.93% 1
GA............ Grady County........ Y................. Y................. 47.38% 40.54% 1
GA............ Greene County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.05% 1
GA............ Habersham County.... Y................. Y................. 47.14% 37.59% 1
GA............ Hall County......... .................. Y................. .......... 44.19% 1
GA............ Hancock County...... Y................. Y................. 46.95% 40.49% 1
GA............ Haralson County..... Y................. Y................. 48.80% 43.26% 1
GA............ Harris County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.09% 1
GA............ Hart County......... Y................. Y................. 49.82% 43.14% 1
GA............ Heard County........ .................. Y................. .......... 40.93% 1
GA............ Henry County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.86% 1
GA............ Houston County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.51% 1
GA............ Irwin County........ Y................. Y................. 46.89% 40.85% 1
GA............ Jackson County...... Y................. Y................. 45.42% 38.97% 1
GA............ Jasper County....... Y................. Y................. 49.56% 48.04% 1
GA............ Jeff Davis County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.56% 1
GA............ Jefferson County.... .................. Y................. .......... 45.24% 1
GA............ Jenkins County...... .................. Y................. .......... 42.93% 1
GA............ Johnson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.33% 1
GA............ Jones County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.24% 1
GA............ Lamar County........ .................. Y................. .......... 43.84% 1
GA............ Lanier County....... Y................. Y................. 45.45% 36.50% 1
GA............ Laurens County...... .................. Y................. .......... 43.06% 1
GA............ Lee County.......... Y................. Y................. 48.75% 46.32% 1
GA............ Liberty County...... Y................. Y................. 38.44% 24.89% 1
GA............ Lincoln County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.32% 1
GA............ Long County......... Y................. Y................. 43.57% 35.33% 1
GA............ Lowndes County...... Y................. Y................. 45.24% 38.01% 1
GA............ Lumpkin County...... Y................. Y................. 49.45% 43.38% 1
GA............ Macon County........ Y................. Y................. 47.42% 43.58% 1
GA............ Madison County...... Y................. Y................. 48.51% 42.80% 1
GA............ Marion County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.86% 1
GA............ McDuffie County..... Y................. Y................. 49.46% 42.93% 1
GA............ McIntosh County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.41% 1
GA............ Meriwether County... Y................. Y................. 48.65% 40.92% 1
GA............ Miller County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.80% 1
GA............ Mitchell County..... Y................. Y................. 42.07% 33.84% 1
GA............ Monroe County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.27% 1
GA............ Montgomery County... Y................. Y................. 48.20% 41.89% 1
GA............ Murray County....... Y................. Y................. 37.54% 32.87% 1
GA............ Muscogee County..... Y................. Y................. 48.64% 39.37% 1
GA............ Newton County....... Y................. Y................. 49.84% 41.56% 1
GA............ Oglethorpe County... .................. Y................. .......... 46.83% 1
GA............ Paulding County..... .................. Y................. .......... 43.47% 1
GA............ Peach County........ Y................. Y................. 48.02% 42.11% 1
GA............ Pickens County...... Y................. Y................. 48.94% 47.32% 1
GA............ Pierce County....... Y................. Y................. 48.56% 41.49% 1
GA............ Pike County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.65% 1
GA............ Polk County......... Y................. Y................. 44.21% 37.79% 1
GA............ Pulaski County...... Y................. Y................. 48.13% 46.54% 1
GA............ Putnam County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.52% 1
GA............ Quitman County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.05% 1
GA............ Rabun County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.78% 1
GA............ Randolph County..... .................. Y................. .......... 45.45% 1
GA............ Richmond County..... Y................. Y................. 49.00% 40.04% 1
GA............ Schley County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.36% 1
GA............ Screven County...... .................. Y................. .......... 42.95% 1
GA............ Seminole County..... Y................. Y................. 48.33% 41.90% 1
GA............ Spalding County..... Y................. Y................. 47.80% 36.78% 1
GA............ Stephens County..... .................. Y................. .......... 43.28% 1
GA............ Stewart County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.97% 1
GA............ Sumter County....... Y................. Y................. 48.23% 41.27% 1
GA............ Tattnall County..... Y................. Y................. 38.98% 34.35% 1
GA............ Taylor County....... .................. Y................. .......... 43.54% 1
GA............ Telfair County...... Y................. Y................. 42.58% 38.55% 1
GA............ Terrell County...... Y................. Y................. 49.77% 40.17% 1
GA............ Thomas County....... Y................. Y................. 48.10% 39.08% 1
GA............ Tift County......... Y................. Y................. 45.07% 39.06% 1
GA............ Toombs County....... Y................. Y................. 48.34% 40.90% 1
GA............ Treutlen County..... .................. Y................. .......... 39.09% 1
GA............ Troup County........ .................. Y................. .......... 42.75% 1
GA............ Turner County....... Y................. Y................. 44.63% 37.39% 1
GA............ Twiggs County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.00% 1
GA............ Upson County........ Y................. Y................. 48.46% 40.86% 1
GA............ Walker County....... Y................. Y................. 44.88% 41.37% 1
GA............ Walton County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.56% 1
GA............ Ware County......... Y................. Y................. 42.73% 36.51% 1
GA............ Warren County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.16% 1
GA............ Washington County... .................. Y................. .......... 43.35% 1
GA............ Wayne County........ Y................. Y................. 45.82%40 .92% 1
GA............ Wheeler County...... Y................. Y................. 39.33% 33.41% 1
GA............ White County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.39% 1
GA............ Whitfield County.... Y................. Y................. 49.52% 45.37% 1
GA............ Wilcox County....... Y................. Y................. 38.32% 36.05% 1
GA............ Worth County........ Y................. Y................. 46.36% 38.89% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
GA Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 137
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HI............ Hawaii County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.17% 1
HI............ Honolulu County..... Y................. Y................. 46.34% 41.91% 1
HI............ Maui County......... Y................. Y................. 48.88% 44.78% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HI Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 3
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ID............ Elmore County....... Y................. Y................. 42.37% 35.19% 1
ID............ Madison County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.77% 1
ID............ Owyhee County....... Y................. Y................. 49.83% 49.21% 1
ID............ Payette County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.75% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ID Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 4
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
IL............ Brown County........ Y................. Y................. 44.89% 47.35% 1
IL............ Coles County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.45% 1
IL............ McDonough County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.22% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
IL Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 3
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
IN............ Allen County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.96% 1
IN............ Blackford County.... .................. Y................. .......... 46.30% 1
IN............ Cass County......... Y................. .................. 48.60% .......... 1
IN............ Clinton County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.83% 1
IN............ Daviess County...... Y................. Y................. 49.80% 46.89% 1
IN............ DeKalb County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.88% 1
IN............ Delaware County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.28% 1
IN............ Elkhart County...... Y................. Y................. 48.16% 44.75% 1
IN............ Fayette County...... .................. Y................. .......... 44.82% 1
IN............ Grant County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.35% 1
IN............ Henry County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.87% 1
IN............ Jackson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.44% 1
IN............ Jennings County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.80% 1
IN............ Kosciusko County.... .................. Y................. .......... 48.34% 1
IN............ LaGrange County..... Y................. Y................. 37.74% 36.75% 1
IN............ LaPorte County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.47% 1
IN............ Lawrence County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.85% 1
IN............ Marion County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.36% 1
IN............ Miami County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.63% 1
IN............ Monroe County....... .................. Y................. .......... 42.51% 1
IN............ Montgomery County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.71% 1
IN............ Morgan County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.62% 1
IN............ Noble County........ Y................. Y................. 48.37% 45.00% 1
IN............ Owen County......... Y................. Y................. 43.65% 40.72% 1
IN............ Parke County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.29% 1
IN............ Putnam County....... Y................. Y................. 46.29% 43.50% 1
IN............ Randolph County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.77% 1
IN............ Scott County........ Y................. Y................. 49.28% 46.39% 1
IN............ Shelby County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.62% 1
IN............ Steuben County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.12% 1
IN............ Sullivan County..... Y................. Y................. 49.19% 49.14% 1
IN............ Switzerland County.. .................. Y................. .......... 48.56% 1
IN............ Tippecanoe County... Y................. Y................. 45.13% 42.42% 1
IN............ Vigo County......... .................. Y................. .......... 45.00% 1
IN............ Wabash County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.98% 1
IN............ Washington County... .................. Y................. .......... 49.09% 1
IN............ Wayne County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.15% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
IN Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 37
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
KS............ Butler County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.78% 1
KS............ Finney County....... Y................. Y................. 48.90% 43.31% 1
KS............ Ford County......... Y................. .................. 49.36% .......... 1
KS............ Geary County........ Y................. Y................. 41.59% 36.31% 1
KS............ Leavenworth County.. .................. Y................. .......... 46.78% 1
KS............ Riley County........ Y................. Y................. 43.07% 37.43% 1
KS............ Seward County....... Y................. Y................. 44.99% 43.50% 1
KS............ Wyandotte County.... .................. Y................. .......... 46.70% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
KS Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 8
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
KY............ Allen County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.00% 1
KY............ Barren County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.35% 1
KY............ Bell County......... Y................. Y................. 48.03% 46.92% 1
KY............ Bourbon County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.78% 1
KY............ Boyd County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.84% 1
KY............ Boyle County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.85% 1
KY............ Bracken County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.00% 1
KY............ Breathitt County.... Y................. Y................. 49.39% 42.47% 1
KY............ Carroll County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.69% 1
KY............ Carter County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.26% 1
KY............ Casey County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.26% 1
KY............ Christian County.... Y................. Y................. 45.15% 34.79% 1
KY............ Clay County......... Y................. Y................. 42.14% 36.94% 1
KY............ Elliott County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.20% 1
KY............ Estill County....... Y................. Y................. 48.36% 40.69% 1
KY............ Floyd County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.68% 1
KY............ Fulton County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.86% 1
KY............ Gallatin County..... .................. Y................. .......... 43.81% 1
KY............ Grant County........ .................. Y................. .......... 44.78% 1
KY............ Grayson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.30% 1
KY............ Hardin County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.05% 1
KY............ Harlan County....... Y................. Y................. 46.15% 42.48% 1
KY............ Harrison County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.36% 1
KY............ Hart County......... Y................. Y................. 49.58% 46.66% 1
KY............ Henderson County.... .................. Y................. .......... 47.80% 1
KY............ Henry County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.32% 1
KY............ Hopkins County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.84% 1
KY............ Jackson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.74% 1
KY............ Johnson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.56% 1
KY............ Knott County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.61% 1
KY............ Knox County......... .................. Y................. .......... 42.28% 1
KY............ Laurel County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.29% 1
KY............ Lawrence County..... .................. Y................. .......... 45.60% 1
KY............ Lee County.......... Y................. Y................. 46.95% 45.21% 1
KY............ Leslie County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.47% 1
KY............ Letcher County...... Y................. Y................. 47.04% 46.70% 1
KY............ Lewis County........ .................. Y................. .......... 43.37% 1
KY............ Lincoln County...... Y................. Y................. 47.74% 44.10% 1
KY............ Logan County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.62% 1
KY............ Madison County...... .................. Y................. .......... 43.21% 1
KY............ Marion County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.60% 1
KY............ Martin County....... Y................. Y................. 49.02% 49.27% 1
KY............ Mason County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.69% 1
KY............ McCreary County..... Y................. Y................. 45.07% 38.89% 1
KY............ Meade County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.47% 1
KY............ Menifee County...... Y................. Y................. 49.91% 45.82% 1
KY............ Morgan County....... Y................. Y................. 46.80% 39.41% 1
KY............ Muhlenberg County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.66% 1
KY............ Owsley County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.71% 1
KY............ Pendleton County.... .................. Y................. .......... 46.79% 1
KY............ Perry County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.58% 1
KY............ Pike County......... .................. Y................. .......... 47.70% 1
KY............ Powell County....... Y................. Y................. 48.87% 44.93% 1
KY............ Rockcastle County... Y................. Y................. 48.66% 41.81% 1
KY............ Rowan County........ Y................. Y................. 49.04% 41.60% 1
KY............ Simpson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.41% 1
KY............ Todd County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.18% 1
KY............ Union County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.32% 1
KY............ Warren County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.97% 1
KY............ Wayne County........ Y................. Y................. 49.67% 44.08% 1
KY............ Webster County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.24% 1
KY............ Whitley County...... Y................. Y................. 48.13% 44.44% 1
KY............ Wolfe County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.67% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
KY Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 63
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LA............ Allen Parish........ Y................. Y................. 47.21% 43.40% 1
LA............ Avoyelles Parish.... Y................. Y................. 49.45% 48.33% 1
LA............ East Carroll Parish. .................. Y................. .......... 49.59% 1
LA............ Terrebonne Parish... .................. Y................. .......... 49.99% 1
LA............ Vernon Parish....... Y................. Y................. 44.68% 37.96% 1
LA............ West Feliciana Y................. Y................. 41.38% 40.48% 1
Parish.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LA Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 6
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MA............ Suffolk County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.07% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MA Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MD............ Allegany County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.55% 1
MD............ Baltimore City...... Y................. Y................. 47.47% 40.43% 1
MD............ Caroline County..... Y................. Y................. 48.85% 41.94% 1
MD............ Cecil County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.93% 1
MD............ Dorchester County... .................. Y................. .......... 49.07% 1
MD............ Garrett County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.84% 1
MD............ Somerset County..... Y................. Y................. 43.78% 38.29% 1
MD............ St. Mary's County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.11% 1
MD............ Washington County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.41% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MD Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 9
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MI............ Branch County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.19% 1
MI............ Chippewa County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.14% 1
MI............ Gratiot County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.45% 1
MI............ Isabella County..... Y................. Y................. 47.00% 42.51% 1
MI............ Luce County......... .................. Y................. .......... 46.24% 1
MI............ Mecosta County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.59% 1
MI............ St. Joseph County... .................. Y................. .......... 49.93% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MI Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 7
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MO............ Butler County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.74% 1
MO............ Crawford County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.64% 1
MO............ DeKalb County....... Y................. Y................. 43.09% 44.38% 1
MO............ Dunklin County...... Y................. Y................. 49.09% 43.36% 1
MO............ Jasper County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.17% 1
MO............ Johnson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.58% 1
MO............ Madison County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.28% 1
MO............ McDonald County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.65% 1
MO............ Mississippi County.. .................. Y................. .......... 46.60% 1
MO............ Pemiscot County..... Y................. Y................. 49.81% 43.41% 1
MO............ Pulaski County...... Y................. Y................. 36.00% 36.13% 1
MO............ Randolph County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.33% 1
MO............ St. Francois County. Y................. Y................. 49.99% 44.73% 1
MO............ Taney County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.52% 1
MO............ Washington County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.42% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MO Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 15
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MS............ Alcorn County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.34% 1
MS............ Attala County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.63% 1
MS............ Bolivar County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.39% 1
MS............ Coahoma County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.81% 1
MS............ Covington County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.96% 1
MS............ DeSoto County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.05% 1
MS............ Forrest County...... Y................. Y................. 47.67% 41.34% 1
MS............ Greene County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.02% 1
MS............ Hancock County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.59% 1
MS............ Harrison County..... Y................. Y................. 46.20% 38.30% 1
MS............ Hinds County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.89% 1
MS............ Itawamba County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.83% 1
MS............ Jackson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.18% 1
MS............ Jasper County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.45% 1
MS............ Jefferson County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.06% 1
MS............ Lafayette County.... Y................. Y................. 47.31% 41.51% 1
MS............ Lauderdale County... .................. Y................. .......... 45.47% 1
MS............ Leake County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.01% 1
MS............ Lee County.......... .................. Y................. .......... 46.17% 1
MS............ Leflore County...... Y................. Y................. 49.10% 42.73% 1
MS............ Lowndes County...... .................. Y................. .......... 44.04% 1
MS............ Marshall County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.35% 1
MS............ Monroe County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.45% 1
MS............ Neshoba County...... Y................. Y................. 49.06% 44.34% 1
MS............ Newton County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.20% 1
MS............ Oktibbeha County.... Y................. Y................. 49.35% 45.11% 1
MS............ Panola County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.29% 1
MS............ Pearl River County.. .................. Y................. .......... 46.69% 1
MS............ Pontotoc County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.57% 1
MS............ Prentiss County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.37% 1
MS............ Quitman County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.64% 1
MS............ Rankin County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.96% 1
MS............ Scott County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.49% 1
MS............ Simpson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.37% 1
MS............ Sunflower County.... Y................. Y................. 41.61% 34.09% 1
MS............ Tate County......... .................. Y................. .......... 47.08% 1
MS............ Tishomingo County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.74% 1
MS............ Tunica County....... Y................. Y................. 45.08% 37.83% 1
MS............ Washington County... Y................. Y................. 47.87% 42.71% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MS Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 39
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MT............ Glacier County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.43% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MT Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NC............ Anson County........ Y................. Y................. 49.38% 42.51% 1
NC............ Avery County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.49% 1
NC............ Bertie County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.33% 1
NC............ Bladen County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.78% 1
NC............ Burke County........ Y................. Y................. 46.56% 47.04% 1
NC............ Caldwell County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.80% 1
NC............ Caswell County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.35% 1
NC............ Chowan County....... Y................. Y................. 48.73% 44.70% 1
NC............ Cleveland County.... .................. Y................. .......... 46.04% 1
NC............ Columbus County..... .................. Y................. .......... 45.88% 1
NC............ Craven County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.41% 1
NC............ Cumberland County... Y................. Y................. 45.77% 36.46% 1
NC............ Davidson County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.02% 1
NC............ Duplin County....... Y................. Y................. 48.60% 44.55% 1
NC............ Edgecombe County.... .................. Y................. .......... 45.73% 1
NC............ Franklin County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.15% 1
NC............ Gaston County....... Y................. Y................. 45.24% 42.47% 1
NC............ Gates County........ .................. Y................. .......... 44.98% 1
NC............ Granville County.... Y................. Y................. 48.35% 42.72% 1
NC............ Greene County....... Y................. Y................. 43.88% 43.39% 1
NC............ Halifax County...... Y................. Y................. 47.30% 40.43% 1
NC............ Harnett County...... Y................. Y................. 45.40% 37.76% 1
NC............ Hertford County..... Y................. Y................. 48.38% 47.27% 1
NC............ Hoke County......... Y................. Y................. 42.28% 38.16% 1
NC............ Hyde County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.67% 1
NC............ Jackson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.71% 1
NC............ Johnston County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.34% 1
NC............ Lee County.......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.89% 1
NC............ Lenoir County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.53% 1
NC............ Martin County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.71% 1
NC............ McDowell County..... Y................. Y................. 49.42% 44.02% 1
NC............ Montgomery County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.95% 1
NC............ Nash County......... .................. Y................. .......... 47.90% 1
NC............ Northampton County.. .................. Y................. .......... 49.32% 1
NC............ Onslow County....... Y................. Y................. 37.64% 28.04% 1
NC............ Pasquotank County... Y................. Y................. 49.80% 42.07% 1
NC............ Pender County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.02% 1
NC............ Perquimans County... .................. Y................. .......... 49.23% 1
NC............ Person County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.29% 1
NC............ Pitt County......... .................. Y................. .......... 43.44% 1
NC............ Randolph County..... .................. Y................. .......... 45.98% 1
NC............ Richmond County..... Y................. Y................. 48.20% 42.09% 1
NC............ Robeson County...... Y................. Y................. 39.12% 35.44% 1
NC............ Rockingham County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.27% 1
NC............ Rowan County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.52% 1
NC............ Rutherford County... .................. Y................. .......... 45.87% 1
NC............ Sampson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.04% 1
NC............ Scotland County..... Y................. Y................. 44.32% 36.64% 1
NC............ Surry County........ Y................. Y................. 49.45% 44.88% 1
NC............ Swain County........ .................. Y................. .......... 44.84% 1
NC............ Vance County........ .................. Y................. .......... 41.84% 1
NC............ Warren County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.36% 1
NC............ Washington County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.62% 1
NC............ Wayne County........ Y................. Y................. 49.84% 41.89% 1
NC............ Wilkes County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.28% 1
NC............ Wilson County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.26% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NC Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 56
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ND............ Benson County....... Y................. Y................. 49.00% 48.68% 1
ND............ Divide County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.09% 1
ND............ Rolette County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.12% 1
ND............ Sioux County........ Y................. Y................. 44.31% 43.54% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ND Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 4
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NE............ Thurston County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.57% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NE Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NJ............ Cumberland County... Y................. Y................. 49.21% 46.56% 1
NJ............ Hudson County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.60% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NJ Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 2
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NM............ Chaves County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.64% 1
NM............ Cibola County....... Y................. Y................. 39.58% 40.44% 1
NM............ Curry County........ Y................. Y................. 46.00% 39.79% 1
NM............ Dona Ana County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.31% 1
NM............ Eddy County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.94% 1
NM............ Grant County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.96% 1
NM............ Guadalupe County.... .................. Y................. .......... 48.12% 1
NM............ Hidalgo County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.17% 1
NM............ Lea County.......... .................. Y................. .......... 40.37% 1
NM............ Lincoln County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.12% 1
NM............ Luna County......... Y................. Y................. 47.89% 45.21% 1
NM............ McKinley County..... Y................. Y................. 45.52% 34.67% 1
NM............ Otero County........ Y................. Y................. 49.95% 40.47% 1
NM............ Rio Arriba County... .................. Y................. .......... 42.57% 1
NM............ Roosevelt County.... .................. Y................. .......... 45.10% 1
NM............ San Juan County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.07% 1
NM............ San Miguel County... .................. Y................. .......... 42.89% 1
NM............ Sierra County....... Y................. Y................. 49.86% 45.20% 1
NM............ Taos County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.58% 1
NM............ Torrance County..... .................. Y................. .......... 43.41% 1
NM............ Valencia County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.66% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NM Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 21
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NV............ Clark County........ .................. Y................. .......... 42.90% 1
NV............ Humboldt County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.88% 1
NV............ Lyon County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.38% 1
NV............ Pershing County..... Y................. Y................. 42.03% 38.00% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NV Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 4
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NY............ Allegany County..... Y................. Y................. 48.61% 49.92% 1
NY............ Bronx County........ .................. Y................. .......... 41.77% 1
NY............ Franklin County..... Y................. Y................. 45.30% 45.10% 1
NY............ Jefferson County.... Y................. Y................. 45.47% 45.21% 1
NY............ Kings County........ .................. Y................. .......... 44.59% 1
NY............ Orleans County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.63% 1
NY............ Queens County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.15% 1
NY............ Richmond County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.87% 1
NY............ St. Lawrence County. Y................. Y................. 47.87% 47.20% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NY Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 9
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OH............ Fayette County...... .................. Y................. .......... 43.93% 1
OH............ Holmes County....... Y................. Y................. 41.53% 36.60% 1
OH............ Madison County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.74% 1
OH............ Marion County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.92% 1
OH............ Pickaway County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.48% 1
OH............ Ross County......... .................. Y................. .......... 46.82% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OH Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 6
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OK............ Adair County........ Y................. Y................. 49.20% 41.40% 1
OK............ Atoka County........ Y................. Y................. 45.78% 40.94% 1
OK............ Beckham County...... Y................. Y................. 48.97% 44.20% 1
OK............ Blaine County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.10% 1
OK............ Bryan County........ .................. Y................. .......... 43.27% 1
OK............ Caddo County........ Y................. Y................. 47.99% 43.51% 1
OK............ Carter County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.31% 1
OK............ Cherokee County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.11% 1
OK............ Choctaw County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.96% 1
OK............ Cleveland County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.84% 1
OK............ Comanche County..... Y................. Y................. 40.97% 36.20% 1
OK............ Craig County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.43% 1
OK............ Creek County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.78% 1
OK............ Delaware County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.13% 1
OK............ Garvin County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.60% 1
OK............ Grady County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.07% 1
OK............ Greer County........ Y................. Y................. 47.00% 44.65% 1
OK............ Hughes County....... Y................. Y................. 49.82% 42.30% 1
OK............ Jackson County...... Y................. Y................. 48.93% 41.87% 1
OK............ Kiowa County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.62% 1
OK............ Latimer County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.53% 1
OK............ Le Flore County..... Y................. Y................. 48.47% 43.18% 1
OK............ McCurtain County.... Y................. Y................. 45.53% 42.87% 1
OK............ Muskogee County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.57% 1
OK............ Nowata County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.43% 1
OK............ Okfuskee County..... Y................. Y................. 47.64% 43.02% 1
OK............ Oklahoma County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.03% 1
OK............ Okmulgee County..... .................. Y................. .......... 45.65% 1
OK............ Osage County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.80% 1
OK............ Ottawa County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.92% 1
OK............ Pawnee County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.73% 1
OK............ Payne County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.51% 1
OK............ Pittsburg County.... .................. Y................. .......... 48.95% 1
OK............ Pontotoc County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.02% 1
OK............ Pottawatomie County. .................. Y................. .......... 46.29% 1
OK............ Seminole County..... .................. Y................. .......... 43.16% 1
OK............ Sequoyah County..... Y................. Y................. 49.55% 43.57% 1
OK............ Texas County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.30% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OK Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 38
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OR............ Malheur County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.59% 1
OR............ Umatilla County..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.59% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OR Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 2
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PA............ Adams County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.89% 1
PA............ Armstrong County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.23% 1
PA............ Berks County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.30% 1
PA............ Blair County........ .................. Y................. .......... 45.37% 1
PA............ Cameron County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.93% 1
PA............ Carbon County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.72% 1
PA............ Centre County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.65% 1
PA............ Clarion County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.71% 1
PA............ Clearfield County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.62% 1
PA............ Clinton County...... Y................. Y................. 47.47% 40.57% 1
PA............ Columbia County..... .................. Y................. .......... 43.38% 1
PA............ Crawford County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.16% 1
PA............ Fayette County...... Y................. Y................. 47.98% 43.20% 1
PA............ Fulton County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.23% 1
PA............ Greene County....... Y................. Y................. 48.64% 43.15% 1
PA............ Huntingdon County... Y................. Y................. 49.61% 44.84% 1
PA............ Indiana County...... .................. Y................. .......... 44.88% 1
PA............ Luzerne County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.82% 1
PA............ Lycoming County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.10% 1
PA............ McKean County....... Y................. Y................. 49.89% 45.52% 1
PA............ Mifflin County...... Y................. Y................. 47.48% 41.90% 1
PA............ Monroe County....... Y................. Y................. 46.99% 47.22% 1
PA............ Montour County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.57% 1
PA............ Northumberland .................. Y................. .......... 45.20% 1
County.
PA............ Perry County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.73% 1
PA............ Schuylkill County... ................ Y................. 49.18% 1
PA............ Snyder County....... ................ Y................. 45.19% 1
PA............ Tioga County........ ................ Y................. 47.12% 1
PA............ Union County........ Y................. Y................. 47.45% 40.92% 1
PA............ Venango County...... ................ Y................. 47.15% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PA Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 30
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SC............ Abbeville County.... Y................. Y................. 49.61% 43.07% 1
SC............ Aiken County........ ................ Y................. 48.98% 1
SC............ Allendale County.... Y................. Y................. 45.64% 41.12% 1
SC............ Anderson County..... Y................. Y................. 49.67% 45.78% 1
SC............ Bamberg County...... ................ Y................. 44.87% 1
SC............ Barnwell County..... ................ Y................. 49.27% 1
SC............ Berkeley County..... Y................. Y................. 49.64% 42.85% 1
SC............ Charleston County... ................ Y................. 48.39% 1
SC............ Cherokee County..... Y................. Y................. 47.50% 42.35% 1
SC............ Chester County...... Y................. Y................. 47.62% 42.07% 1
SC............ Chesterfield County. Y................. Y................. 44.48% 40.52% 1
SC............ Clarendon County.... ................. Y................. 47.36% 1
SC............ Colleton County..... Y................. Y................. 48.98% 48.62% 1
SC............ Darlington County... ................. Y................. 44.26% 1
SC............ Dillon County....... Y................. Y................. 41.90% 41.64% 1
SC............ Dorchester County... ................. Y................. 49.83% 1
SC............ Edgefield County.... ................. Y................. 47.61% 1
SC............ Fairfield County.... ................. Y................. 48.72% 1
SC............ Florence County..... ................. Y................. 44.99% 1
SC............ Georgetown County... ................. Y................. 49.41% 1
SC............ Greenwood County.... Y................. Y................. 47.27% 43.28% 1
SC............ Horry County........ ................. Y................. 48.84% 47.27% 1
SC............ Jasper County....... Y................. Y................. 46.30% 45.15% 1
SC............ Lancaster County.... Y................. Y................. 44.42% 45.74% 1
SC............ Laurens County...... Y................. Y................. 45.10% 39.81% 1
SC............ Lee County.......... ................. Y................. 45.46% 1
SC............ Marion County....... ................. Y................. 48.00% 1
SC............ Marlboro County..... Y................. Y................. 41.13% 37.22% 1
SC............ McCormick County.... ................. Y................. 45.65% 1
SC............ Newberry County..... Y................. Y................. 45.19% 46.69% 1
SC............ Oconee County....... ................. Y................. 46.92% 1
SC............ Orangeburg County... ................. Y................. 48.54% 1
SC............ Pickens County...... Y................. Y................. 46.53% 41.18% 1
SC............ Richland County..... ................. Y................. 49.22% 1
SC............ Spartanburg County.. Y................. Y................. 49.65% 44.93% 1
SC............ Sumter County....... Y................. Y................. 48.68% 41.34% 1
SC............ Union County........ ................. Y................. 48.70% 1
SC............ Williamsburg County. ................. Y................. 42.78% 1
SC............ York County......... ................. Y................. 45.61% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SC Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 39
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SD............ Bennett County...... ................. Y................. 49.21% 1
SD............ Brookings County.... ................. Y................. 49.86% 1
SD............ Buffalo County...... ................. Y................. 34.52% 1
SD............ Clay County......... ................. Y................. 47.55% 1
SD............ Corson County....... ................. Y................. 47.03% 1
SD............ Dewey County........ ................. Y................. 46.24% 1
SD............ Shannon County...... ................. Y................. 28.62% 1
SD............ Todd County......... ................. Y................. 29.61% 1
SD............ Ziebach County...... ................. Y................. 48.23% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SD Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 9
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TN............ Bedford County...... Y................. Y................. 47.07% 46.73% 1
TN............ Benton County....... ................. Y................. 49.17% 1
TN............ Bledsoe County...... Y................. Y................. 48.67% 44.22% 1
TN............ Bradley County...... ................. Y................. 44.61% 1
TN............ Campbell County..... Y................. Y................. 45.08% 40.63% 1
TN............ Cannon County....... ................. Y................. 49.45% 1
TN............ Carroll County...... ................. Y................. 48.15% 1
TN............ Carter County....... Y................. Y................. 45.68% 42.99% 1
TN............ Cheatham County..... ................. Y................. 48.86% 1
TN............ Chester County...... ................. Y................. 48.94% 1
TN............ Claiborne County.... Y................. Y................. 44.30% 39.60% 1
TN............ Cocke County........ Y................. Y................. 45.59% 39.78% 1
TN............ Davidson County..... ................. Y................. 49.84% 1
TN............ Decatur County...... ................. Y................. 48.21% 1
TN............ DeKalb County....... ................. Y................. 47.96% 1
TN............ Dickson County...... ................. Y................. 49.31% 1
TN............ Dyer County......... Y................. Y................. 49.25% 43.19% 1
TN............ Fentress County..... ................. Y................. 47.87% 1
TN............ Franklin County..... ................. Y................. 49.16% 1
TN............ Gibson County....... ................. Y................. 47.13% 1
TN............ Giles County........ ................. Y................. 45.63% 1
TN............ Grainger County..... Y................. Y................. 44.47% 39.21% 1
TN............ Greene County....... Y................. Y................. 47.93% 43.00% 1
TN............ Grundy County....... Y................. Y................. 44.98% 42.94% 1
TN............ Hamblen County...... ................. Y................. 46.28% 1
TN............ Hancock County...... Y................. Y................. 48.71% 39.81% 1
TN............ Hardeman County..... Y................. Y................. 48.60% 41.43% 1
TN............ Hardin County....... Y................. Y................. 48.84% 44.73% 1
TN............ Hawkins County...... Y................. Y................. 46.89% 41.73% 1
TN............ Haywood County...... ................. Y................. 45.28% 1
TN............ Henderson County.... ................. Y................. 43.66% 1
TN............ Hickman County...... Y................. Y................. 48.82% 43.44% 1
TN............ Humphreys County.... ................. Y................. 49.19% 1
TN............ Jefferson County.... Y................. Y................. 45.91% 41.79% 1
TN............ Johnson County...... Y................. Y................. 43.78% 40.39% 1
TN............ Lake County......... ................. Y................. 34.27% 1
TN............ Lauderdale County... Y................. Y................. 42.73% 37.58% 1
TN............ Lawrence County..... ................. Y................. 49.39% 1
TN............ Lincoln County...... ................. Y................. 44.79% 1
TN............ Macon County........ Y................. Y................. 46.98% 43.83% 1
TN............ Marion County....... ................. Y................. 48.56% 1
TN............ Marshall County..... ................. Y................. 47.67% 1
TN............ Maury County........ ................. Y................. 46.42% 1
TN............ McMinn County....... Y................. Y................. 46.00% 44.95% 1
TN............ McNairy County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.19% 1
TN............ Meigs County........ Y................. Y................. 46.64% 40.81% 1
TN............ Monroe County....... Y................. Y................. 48.94% 44.64% 1
TN............ Montgomery County... Y................. Y................. 48.73% 41.49% 1
TN............ Morgan County....... Y................. Y................. 46.54% 40.59% 1
TN............ Overton County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.75% 1
TN............ Perry County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.85% 1
TN............ Polk County......... .................. Y................. .......... 45.37% 1
TN............ Putnam County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.54% 1
TN............ Rhea County......... Y................. Y................. 48.36% 45.45% 1
TN............ Rutherford County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.70% 1
TN............ Scott County........ Y................. Y................. 46.82% 42.42% 1
TN............ Sequatchie County... .................. Y................. .......... 45.75% 1
TN............ Sevier County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.74% 1
TN............ Sullivan County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.86% 1
TN............ Tipton County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.84% 1
TN............ Unicoi County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.17% 1
TN............ Union County........ Y................. Y................. 45.85% 44.14% 1
TN............ Warren County....... Y................. Y................. 49.18% 46.73% 1
TN............ Washington County... .................. Y................. .......... 45.54% 1
TN............ Wayne County........ Y................. Y................. 44.24% 40.18% 1
TN............ Weakley County...... .................. Y................. .......... 43.95% 1
TN............ White County........ .................. Y................. .......... 44.21% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TN Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 67
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TX............ Anderson County..... Y................. Y................. 38.31% 35.28% 1
TX............ Andrews County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.67% 1
TX............ Angelina County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.12% 1
TX............ Aransas County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.72% 1
TX............ Atascosa County..... Y................. Y................. 41.68% 42.10% 1
TX............ Bastrop County...... Y................. Y................. 48.93% 47.40% 1
TX............ Bee County.......... Y................. Y................. 38.19% 33.90% 1
TX............ Bell County......... Y................. Y................. 48.23% 39.22% 1
TX............ Bexar County........ Y................. Y................. 47.60% 44.77% 1
TX............ Bowie County........ .................. Y................. .......... 45.67% 1
TX............ Brazoria County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.37% 1
TX............ Brazos County....... Y................. Y................. 46.16% 42.97% 1
TX............ Brooks County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.40% 1
TX............ Brown County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.14% 1
TX............ Burleson County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.74% 1
TX............ Caldwell County..... Y................. Y................. 45.59% 42.43% 1
TX............ Calhoun County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.61% 1
TX............ Cameron County...... Y................. Y................. 35.61% 35.53% 1
TX............ Camp County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.71% 1
TX............ Cass County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.49% 1
TX............ Castro County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.86% 1
TX............ Cherokee County..... Y................. Y................. 47.84% 45.33% 1
TX............ Childress County.... Y................. Y................. 37.92% 36.52% 1
TX............ Concho County....... Y................. Y................. 37.68% 33.90% 1
TX............ Coryell County...... Y................. Y................. 32.80% 28.14% 1
TX............ Crosby County....... .................. Y................. .......... 42.00% 1
TX............ Culberson County.... Y................. .................. 46.90% .......... 1
TX............ Dallam County....... Y................. Y................. 45.90% 44.40% 1
TX............ Dallas County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.29% 1
TX............ Dawson County....... Y................. Y................. 43.23% 44.34% 1
TX............ Deaf Smith County... Y................. Y................. 47.15% 44.28% 1
TX............ Delta County........ Y................. Y................. 49.21% 48.02% 1
TX............ DeWitt County....... Y................. Y................. 43.60% 41.23% 1
TX............ Dickens County...... Y................. Y................. 48.01% 39.52% 1
TX............ Duval County........ Y................. .................. 47.70% .......... 1
TX............ Eastland County..... Y................. Y................. 49.07% 46.96% 1
TX............ Ector County........ Y................. Y................. 45.71% 42.47% 1
TX............ El Paso County...... Y................. Y................. 43.40% 39.27% 1
TX............ Erath County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.15% 1
TX............ Falls County........ Y................. Y................. 46.71% 43.93% 1
TX............ Fannin County....... Y................. Y................. 47.96% 44.39% 1
TX............ Floyd County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.31% 1
TX............ Foard County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.80% 1
TX............ Freestone County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.59% 1
TX............ Frio County......... Y................. Y................. 34.60% 37.02% 1
TX............ Gaines County....... Y................. Y................. 48.57% 42.28% 1
TX............ Gonzales County..... Y................. Y................. 46.95% 49.53% 1
TX............ Gray County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.72% 1
TX............ Grayson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.77% 1
TX............ Gregg County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.29% 1
TX............ Grimes County....... Y................. Y................. 43.33% 39.89% 1
TX............ Hale County......... Y................. Y................. 43.31% 38.06% 1
TX............ Hall County......... Y................. .................. 48.48% .......... 1
TX............ Hardeman County..... .................. Y................. .......... 44.63% 1
TX............ Harris County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.61% 1
TX............ Hartley County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.12% 1
TX............ Hays County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.49% 1
TX............ Henderson County.... Y................. Y................. 48.97% 47.66% 1
TX............ Hidalgo County...... Y................. Y................. 36.31% 37.42% 1
TX............ Hill County......... .................. Y................. .......... 46.79% 1
TX............ Hockley County...... Y................. Y................. 47.05% 43.53% 1
TX............ Hopkins County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.36% 1
TX............ Houston County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.52% 1
TX............ Howard County....... Y................. Y................. 43.64% 39.65% 1
TX............ Hunt County......... Y................. Y................. 47.84% 45.17% 1
TX............ Jack County......... Y................. Y................. 45.46% 45.26% 1
TX............ Jackson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.72% 1
TX............ Jasper County....... Y................. Y................. 49.72% 45.64% 1
TX............ Jefferson County.... .................. Y................. .......... 48.65% 1
TX............ Jim Wells County.... Y................. Y................. 45.12% 45.62% 1
TX............ Johnson County...... Y................. Y................. 47.14% 44.58% 1
TX............ Jones County........ Y................. Y................. 38.22% 37.77% 1
TX............ Karnes County....... Y................. Y................. 40.07% 36.77% 1
TX............ Kaufman County...... Y................. Y................. 49.73% 47.58% 1
TX............ Kleberg County...... Y................. Y................. 45.61% 41.91% 1
TX............ La Salle County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.78% 1
TX............ Lamar County........ Y................. Y................. 47.69% 43.70% 1
TX............ Lamb County......... Y................. Y................. 42.59% 46.66% 1
TX............ Lampasas County..... Y................. .................. 48.73% .......... 1
TX............ Liberty County...... Y................. Y................. 41.41% 41.33% 1
TX............ Limestone County.... Y................. Y................. 47.99% 45.22% 1
TX............ Live Oak County..... Y................. Y................. 46.08% 42.46% 1
TX............ Lubbock County...... .................. Y................. .......... 43.03% 1
TX............ Lynn County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.27% 1
TX............ Madison County...... Y................. Y................. 42.13% 36.84% 1
TX............ Marion County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.50% 1
TX............ Matagorda County.... Y................. .................. 49.30% .......... 1
TX............ Maverick County..... Y................. Y................. 44.23% 45.29% 1
TX............ McCulloch County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.58% 1
TX............ McLennan County..... .................. Y................. .......... 46.24% 1
TX............ Medina County....... Y................. Y................. 49.03% 47.38% 1
TX............ Milam County........ Y................. Y................. 49.28% 48.77% 1
TX............ Mitchell County..... Y................. Y................. 34.85% 33.85% 1
TX............ Moore County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.79% 1
TX............ Nacogdoches County.. Y................. Y................. 49.43% 46.27% 1
TX............ Navarro County...... Y................. Y................. 49.73% 46.19% 1
TX............ Newton County....... .................. Y................. .......... 45.04% 1
TX............ Nolan County........ Y................. Y................. 48.93% 47.06% 1
TX............ Nueces County....... Y................. Y................. 48.03% 45.26% 1
TX............ Orange County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.55% 1
TX............ Palo Pinto County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.02% 1
TX............ Parmer County....... Y................. Y................. 47.84% 48.05% 1
TX............ Pecos County........ Y................. Y................. 42.17% 39.26% 1
TX............ Potter County....... Y................. Y................. 36.91% 33.34% 1
TX............ Rains County........ Y................. Y................. 47.88% 48.78% 1
TX............ Red River County.... .................. Y................. .......... 48.62% 1
TX............ Reeves County....... Y................. Y................. 44.61% 38.62% 1
TX............ Runnels County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.77% 1
TX............ Rusk County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.46% 1
TX............ San Jacinto County.. Y................. Y................. 44.38% 47.40% 1
TX............ San Patricio County. Y................. Y................. 45.54% 41.28% 1
TX............ Scurry County....... Y................. Y................. 46.76% 44.53% 1
TX............ Smith County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.92% 1
TX............ Starr County........ Y................. Y................. 38.83% 37.44% 1
TX............ Stephens County..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.03% 1
TX............ Swisher County...... Y................. Y................. 38.55% 43.25% 1
TX............ Taylor County....... .................. Y................. .......... 47.66% 1
TX............ Terry County........ Y................. Y................. 46.92% 46.48% 1
TX............ Titus County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.22% 1
TX............ Tom Green County.... .................. Y................. .......... 46.83% 1
TX............ Tyler County........ Y................. Y................. 48.69% 44.76% 1
TX............ Uvalde County....... Y................. .................. 49.94% .......... 1
TX............ Val Verde County.... Y................. Y................. 44.19% 46.12% 1
TX............ Victoria County..... Y................. Y................. 49.64% 47.47% 1
TX............ Walker County....... Y................. Y................. 35.90% 29.22% 1
TX............ Waller County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.50% 1
TX............ Webb County......... Y................. Y................. 40.39% 34.47% 1
TX............ Wharton County...... Y................. Y................. 49.52% 48.34% 1
TX............ Wichita County...... Y................. Y................. 48.94% 44.71% 1
TX............ Wilbarger County.... .................. Y................. .......... 44.72% 1
TX............ Willacy County...... Y................. Y................. 39.47% 40.42% 1
TX............ Winkler County...... Y................. Y................. 48.81% 46.74% 1
TX............ Wise County......... Y................. Y................. 49.86% 48.59% 1
TX............ Wood County......... .................. Y................. .......... 49.37% 1
TX............ Zapata County....... Y................. Y................. 40.62% 39.42% 1
TX............ Zavala County....... Y................. Y................. 43.84% 48.52% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TX Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 136
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
UT............ Tooele County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.86% 1
UT............ Weber County........ .................. Y................. .......... 48.91% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
UT Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 2
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
VA............ Accomack County..... Y................. Y................. 46.02% 42.82% 1
VA............ Amherst County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.39% 1
VA............ Bedford city........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.53% 1
VA............ Bland County........ Y................. Y................. 49.45% 48.55% 1
VA............ Bristol city........ Y................. Y................. 48.96% 45.53% 1
VA............ Brunswick County.... Y................. Y................. 47.85% 41.15% 1
VA............ Buchanan County..... Y................. Y................. 49.15% 46.72% 1
VA............ Buckingham County... Y................. Y................. 48.06% 45.21% 1
VA............ Buena Vista city.... Y................. Y................. 48.79% 40.05% 1
VA............ Carroll County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.81% 1
VA............ Charlottesville city .................. Y................. .......... 36.21% 1
VA............ Clifton Forge city.. .................. Y................. .......... 45.18% 1
VA............ Covington city...... Y................. Y................. 48.62% 45.33% 1
VA............ Culpeper County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.41% 1
VA............ Danville city....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.78% 1
VA............ Dinwiddie County.... .................. Y................. .......... 49.39% 1
VA............ Fredericksburg city. Y................. Y................. 48.80% 43.77% 1
VA............ Galax city.......... Y................. Y................. 49.82% 46.24% 1
VA............ Grayson County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.94% 1
VA............ Greene County....... .................. Y................. .......... 49.31% 1
VA............ Greensville County.. Y................. Y................. 44.32% 41.33% 1
VA............ Halifax County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.53% 1
VA............ Hampton city........ .................. Y................. .......... 43.97% 1
VA............ Harrisonburg city... Y................. Y................. 34.37% 31.35% 1
VA............ Henry County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.02% 1
VA............ Hopewell city....... Y................. Y................. 49.53% 43.11% 1
VA............ King George County.. .................. Y................. .......... 48.55% 1
VA............ Lee County.......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.08% 1
VA............ Lexington city...... Y................. Y................. 37.45% 35.55% 1
VA............ Lunenburg County.... .................. Y................. .......... 44.93% 1
VA............ Lynchburg city...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.32% 1
VA............ Manassas Park city.. .................. Y................. .......... 41.80% 1
VA............ Martinsville city... Y................. Y................. 48.99% 48.57% 1
VA............ Mecklenburg County.. Y................. Y................. 49.98% 46.38% 1
VA............ Montgomery County... Y................. Y................. 45.69% 41.23% 1
VA............ Newport News city... .................. Y................. .......... 45.41% 1
VA............ Norfolk city........ Y................. Y................. 40.43% 35.77% 1
VA............ Norton city......... .................. Y................. 48.94% .......... 1
VA............ Nottoway County..... .................. Y................. .......... 45.97% 1
VA............ Page County......... .................. Y................. .......... 45.07% 1
VA............ Patrick County...... .................. Y................. .......... 49.31% 1
VA............ Petersburg city..... Y................. Y................. 49.57% 44.14% 1
VA............ Portsmouth city..... .................. Y................. .......... 47.80% 1
VA............ Prince Edward County Y................. Y................. 45.33% 40.80% 1
VA............ Prince George County .................. Y................. .......... 45.51% 1
VA............ Pulaski County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.56% 1
VA............ Radford city........ Y................. Y................. 38.30% 32.69% 1
VA............ Richmond city....... .................. Y................. .......... 43.90% 1
VA............ Richmond County..... Y................. Y................. 44.99% 41.59% 1
VA............ Roanoke city........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.55% 1
VA............ Rockbridge County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.83% 1
VA............ Rockingham County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.23% 1
VA............ Russell County...... .................. Y................. .......... 45.31% 1
VA............ Smyth County........ Y................. Y................. 48.33% 45.36% 1
VA............ Southampton County.. .................. Y................. .......... 49.80% 1
VA............ Staunton city....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.92% 1
VA............ Sussex County....... Y................. Y................. 45.85% 39.15% 1
VA............ Tazewell County..... Y................. Y................. 49.49% 46.92% 1
VA............ Warren County....... .................. Y................. .......... 48.00% 1
VA............ Waynesboro city..... .................. Y................. .......... 48.61% 1
VA............ Westmoreland County. .................. Y................. .......... 47.52% 1
VA............ Williamsburg city... Y................. Y................. 42.82% 35.54% 1
VA............ Winchester city..... .................. Y................. .......... 45.44% 1
VA............ Wise County......... Y................. Y................. 43.62% 43.19% 1
VA............ Wythe County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.32% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
VA Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 65
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WI............ Menominee County.... .................. Y................. .......... 45.15% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WI Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WV............ Berkeley County..... .................. Y................. .......... 41.19% 1
WV............ Boone County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.73% 1
WV............ Braxton County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.85% 1
WV............ Brooke County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.57% 1
WV............ Cabell County....... .................. Y................. .......... 41.82% 1
WV............ Calhoun County...... .................. Y................. .......... 44.49% 1
WV............ Clay County......... .................. Y................. .......... 46.54% 1
WV............ Fayette County...... Y................. Y................. 45.51% 39.40% 1
WV............ Gilmer County....... Y................. Y................. 49.33% 48.34% 1
WV............ Greenbrier County... .................. Y................. .......... 47.47% 1
WV............ Hampshire County.... Y................. Y................. 48.26% 40.32% 1
WV............ Hardy County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.61% 1
WV............ Jefferson County.... .................. Y................. .......... 45.23% 1
WV............ Kanawha County...... .................. Y................. .......... 48.97% 1
WV............ Lewis County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.71% 1
WV............ Lincoln County...... Y................. Y................. 47.95% 44.10% 1
WV............ Logan County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.19% 1
WV............ Marshall County..... .................. Y................. .......... 49.35% 1
WV............ McDowell County..... Y................. Y................. 38.19% 34.90% 1
WV............ Mercer County....... Y................. Y................. 45.53% 38.07% 1
WV............ Mineral County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.32% 1
WV............ Mingo County........ .................. Y................. .......... 46.98% 1
WV............ Monongalia County... .................. Y................. .......... 42.03% 1
WV............ Monroe County....... .................. Y................. .......... 44.16% 1
WV............ Nicholas County..... .................. Y................. .......... 42.19% 1
WV............ Ohio County......... .................. Y................. .......... 48.45% 1
WV............ Pocahontas County... .................. Y................. .......... 48.21% 1
WV............ Preston County...... .................. Y................. .......... 46.77% 1
WV............ Raleigh County...... Y................. Y................. 48.72% 38.98% 1
WV............ Randolph County..... .................. Y................. .......... 43.62% 1
WV............ Ritchie County...... .................. Y................. .......... 47.87% 1
WV............ Roane County........ .................. Y................. .......... 47.64% 1
WV............ Summers County...... Y................. Y................. 48.11% 45.70% 1
WV............ Taylor County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.18% 1
WV............ Upshur County....... Y................. Y................. 49.35% 44.98% 1
WV............ Wayne County........ .................. Y................. .......... 49.53% 1
WV............ Webster County...... Y................. Y................. 47.90% 44.22% 1
WV............ Wetzel County....... .................. Y................. .......... 46.67% 1
WV............ Wyoming County...... Y................. Y................. 44.64% 39.54% 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WV Count .................. .................. .......... .......... 39
================================================================================================================
Total Counties Covered Under Proposed Formula....................... 1010
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
XII. Additional Views of Mr. Leahy, Mr. Kennedy, Mr. Biden, Mr. Kohl,
Mrs. Feinstein, Mr. Feingold, Mr. Schumer and Mr. Durbin in Support of
S. 2703
We object and do not subscribe to this Committee Report on
S. 2703, the Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments
Act (VRARA), which by including Additional Views signed by the
Chairman, has become a very different document than the draft
Report circulated by the Chairman on July 24, 2006. As sponsors
of the Senate legislation who have supported it, pressed for
its enactment and voted for it, we must register our
disappointment that this Report does not reflect our views or
those of scores of other cosponsors, does not properly describe
the record supporting our bill, and does not fully endorse the
bill we introduced and sponsored and that we and all Members of
the Committee voted to report favorably to the Senate. Although
the Senate Committee Report filed today does not make any
findings based on the extensive record created in both the
House and Senate, those findings can be found in the text of
the legislation itself. We submit these additional views to
note for the record the unique procedural posture of the
Committee's actions today.
On July 19, 2006, the Committee debated and voted on two
amendments to the VRARA.\1\ No other amendments were offered
and there was no further clarifying debate during this session.
Then, the Committee unanimously voted to report the legislation
favorably to the full Senate. The following day, on July 20,
2006, the full Senate debated H.R. 9,\2\ the companion bill
that had been passed by the House of Representatives. No
amendments were offered and the Senate voted 98-0 for final
passage.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Senator Coburn offered the only substantive amendment in the
Senate Judiciary Committee. His amendment related to Section 203 of the
Voting Rights Act. It was debated and then defeated by a voice vote.
Senator Leahy offered an amendment to add the name of Cesar Chavez to
the short title, which was adopted.
\2\ The House and the Senate legislation are virtually identical.
The only difference between them reflects an amendment adopted in the
House Judiciary Committee to order a study about Section 203 and an
amendment adopted in the Senate Judiciary Committee to add the name of
Cesar Chavez to the short title.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Senate Judiciary Committee Report on the VRARA is being
filed close to a week after the Senate unanimously passed its
companion bill, H.R. 9.
At the time of floor debate and consideration of final
passage of H.R. 9 in the Senate, Senators had the following to
inform their vote: the extensive Senate Judiciary Committee
record, including thousands of pages of testimony; the full
record before the House of Representatives, including thousands
of pages of testimony; the House Committee Report; and the full
debate on the floor of the House of Representatives, including
debate surrounding four substantive amendments to H.R. 9 that
were all rejected. Most importantly, at the time they voted,
all Senators had before them the detailed findings in Section 2
of the legislation.\3\ These findings are identical in H.R. 9
and S. 2703 and, as reauthorization measures, both incorporated
the statutory findings within the following provisions of the
Voting Rights Act of 1965: Section 203(a); \4\ Section 4(f)(1);
\5\ Section 10(a); \6\ and Section 202(a).\7\ At the time of
floor debate and consideration of H.R. 9 in the Senate, no
draft Senate Committee Report was available to Senators.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ See, e.g., ``Evidence of continued discrimination includes * *
* the hundreds of objections interposed, requests for more information
submitted followed by voting changes withdrawn from consideration by
jurisdictions covered by the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and section 5
enforcement actions undertaken by the Department of Justice in covered
jurisdictions since 1982 that prevented election practices, such as
annexation, at-large voting, and the use of multi-member districts,
from being enacted to dilute minority voting strength; * * * the number
of requests for declaratory judgments denied by the United States
District Court for the District of Columbia; * * * the continued filing
of section 2 cases that originated in covered jurisdictions; and * * *
the litigation pursued by the Department of Justice since 1982 to
enforce sections 4(e), 4(f)(4), and 203 of such Act to ensure that all
language minority citizens have full access to the political process.''
Section 2(b)(4). See also Section 2(b)(3) (``The continued evidence of
racially polarized voting in each of the jurisdictions covered by the
expiring provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 demonstrates that
racial and language minorities remain politically vulnerable,
warranting the continued protection of the Voting Rights Act of
1965.'').
\4\ The Congress finds that, through the use of various practices
and procedures, citizens of language minorities have been effectively
excluded from participation in the electoral process. Among other
factors, the denial of the right to vote of such minority group
citizens is ordinarily directly related to the unequal educational
opportunities afforded them, resulting in high illiteracy and low
voting participation. The Congress declares that, in order to enforce
the guarantees of the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments to the United
States Constitution, it is necessary to eliminate such discrimination
by prohibiting these practices, and by prescribing other remedial
devices. 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1973aa-1a(a).
\5\ The Congress finds that voting discrimination against citizens
of language minorities is pervasive and national in scope. Such
minority citizens are from environments in which the dominant language
is other than English. In addition they have been denied equal
educational opportunities by State and local governments, resulting in
severe disabilities and continuing illiteracy in the English language.
The Congress further finds that, where State and local officials
conduct elections only in English, language minority citizens are
excluded from participating in the electoral process. In many areas of
the country, this exclusion is aggravated by acts of physical,
economic, and political intimidation. The Congress declares that, in
order to enforce the guarantees of the fourteenth and fifteenth
amendments to the United States Constitution, it is necessary to
eliminate such discrimination by prohibiting English-only elections,
and by prescribing other remedial devices. 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1973b(f)(1).
\6\ 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1973h(a).
\7\ 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1973aa-1(a).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
By voting to pass the legislation, Congress has adopted and
reaffirmed the detailed findings in H.R. 9. The Senate
unanimously adopted these findings. Nothing written by a Member
of Congress after final passage can diminish the force of those
findings contained within the enacted legislation itself or the
Member's vote supporting them. As several courts have
suggested, post-passage legislative history is a contradiction
in terms. Any after-the-fact attempts to re-characterize the
legislation's language and effects should not be credited.
Patrick J. Leahy.
Edward M. Kennedy.
Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
Herbert Kohl.
Dianne Feinstein.
Russell D. Feingold.
Charles E. Schumer.
Richard J. Durbin.
XIII. Changes in Existing Law Made by the Bill, as Reported
Changes in existing law made by the bill, as reported, are
shown as follows (existing law proposed to be omitted is
enclosed in black brackets, new matter is printed in italic,
existing law in which no change is proposed is shown in roman):
VOTING RIGHTS ACT OF 1965
TITLE I--VOTING RIGHTS
* * * * * * *
Sec. 3. (a) Whenever the Attorney General or an aggrieved
person institutes a proceeding under any statute to enforce the
voting guarantees of the fourteenth or fifteenth amendment in
any State or political subdivision the court shall authorize
the appointment of Federal [examiners] observers by the
Director of the Office of Personnel Management in accordance
with section 6 to serve for such period of time and for such
political subdivisions as the court shall determine is
appropriate to enforce the voting guarantees of the fourteenth
or fifteenth amendment (1) as part of any interlocutory order
if the court determines that the appointment of such
[examiners] observers is necessary to enforce such voting
guarantees or (2) as part of any final judgment if the court
finds that violations of the fourteenth or fifteenth amendment
justifying equitable relief have occurred in such State or
subdivision: Provided, That the court need not authorize the
appointment of [examiners] observers if any incidents of denial
or abridgement of the right to vote on account of race or
color, or in contravention of the voting guarantees set forth
in section 4(f)(2) (1) have been few in number and have been
promptly and effectively corrected by State or local action,
(2) the continuing effect of such incidents has been
eliminated, and (3) there is no reasonable probability of their
recurrence in the future.
* * * * * * *
Sec. 4. (a)(1) To assure that the right of citizens of the
United States to vote is not denied or abridged on account of
race or color, no citizen shall be denied the right to vote in
any Federal, State, or local election because of his failure to
comply with any test or device in any State with respect to
which the determinations have been made under the first two
sentences of subsection (b) of this section or in any political
subdivision of such State (as such subdivision existed on the
date such determinations were made with respect to such State),
though such determinations were not made with respect to such
subdivision as a separate unit, or in any political subdivision
with respect to which such determinations have been made as a
separate unit, unless the United States District Court for the
District of Columbia issues a declaratory judgment under this
section. No citizen shall be denied the right to vote in any
Federal, State, or local election because of his failure to
comply with any test or device in any State with respect to
which the determinations have been made under the third
sentence of subsection (b) of this section or in any political
subdivision of such State (as such subdivision existed on the
date such determinations were made with respect to such State),
though such determinations were not made with respect to such
subdivision as a separate unit, or in any political subdivision
with respect to which such determinations have been made as a
separate unit, unless the United States District Court for the
District of Columbia issues a declaratory judgment under this
section. A declaratory judgment under this section shall issue
only if such court determines that during the ten years
preceding the filing of the action, and during the pendency of
such action--
(A) * * *
* * * * * * *
(C) no Federal examiners or observers under this Act
have been assigned to such State or political
subdivision;
* * * * * * *
(7) The Congress shall reconsider the provisions of this
section at the end of the fifteen-year period following the
effective date of the amendments made by the [Voting Rights Act
Amendments of 1982] Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott
King, and Cesar E. Chavez Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and
Amendments Act of 2006.
(8) The provisions of this section shall expire at the end
of the 25-year period following the effective date of the
amendments made by the [Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1982]
Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King, and Cesar E.
Chavez Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of
2006.
* * * * * * *
(b) The provisions of subsection (a) of this section shall
apply in any State or in any political subdivision of a State
which (1) the Attorney General determines maintained on
November 1, 1964, any test or device, and with respect to which
(2) the Director of the Census determines that less than 50 per
centum of the persons of voting age residing therein were
registered on November 1, 1964, or that less than 50 per centum
of such persons voted in the presidential election of November
1964. On and after August 6, 1970, in addition to any State or
political subdivision of a State determined to be subject to
subsection (a) of this section pursuant to the previous
sentence, the provisions of subsection (a) of this section
shall apply in any State or any political subdivision of a
State which (i) the Attorney General determines maintained on
November 1, 1968, any test or device, and with respect to which
(ii) the Director of the Census determines that less than 50
per centum of the persons of voting age residing therein were
registered on November 1, 1968, or that less than 50 per centum
of such persons voted in the presidential election of November
1968. On and after August 6, 1975, in addition to any State or
political subdivision of a State determined to be subject to
subsection (a) of this section pursuant to the previous two
sentences, the provisions of subsection (a) of this section
shall apply in any State or any political subdivision of a
State which (i) the Attorney General determines maintained on
November 1, 1972, any test or device, and with respect to which
(ii) the Director of the Census determines that less than 50
per centum of the citizens of voting age were registered on
November 1, 1972, or that less than 50 per centum of such
persons voted in the Presidential election of November 1972.
A determination or certification of the Attorney General or
of the Director of the Census under this section or under
[section 6] section 8 or 13 shall not be reviewable in any
court and shall be effective upon publication in the Federal
Register.
* * * * * * *
Sec. 5. (a) Whenever a State or political subdivision with
respect to which the prohibitions set forth in section 4(a)
based upon determinations made under the first sentence of
section 4(b) are in effect shall enact or seek to administer
any voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or
standard, practice, or procedure with respect to voting
different from that in force or effect on November 1, 1964, or
whenever a State or political subdivision with respect to which
the prohibitions set forth in section 4(a) based upon
determinations made under the second sentence of section 4(b)
are in effect shall enact or seek to administer any voting
qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice,
or procedure with respect to voting different from that in
force or effect on November 1, 1968, or whenever a State or
political subdivision with respect to which the prohibitions
set forth in section 4(a) based upon determinations made under
the third sentence of section 4(b) are in effect shall enact or
seek to administer any voting qualification or prerequisite to
voting, or standard, practice, or procedure with respect to
voting different from that in force or effect on November 1,
1972, such State or subdivision may institute an action in the
United States District Court for the District of Columbia for a
declaratory judgment that such qualification, prerequisite,
standard, practice, or procedure [does not have the purpose and
will not have the effect] neither has the purpose nor will have
the effect of denying or abridging the right to vote on account
of race or color, or in contravention of the guarantees set
forth in section 4(f)(2), and unless and until the court enters
such judgment no person shall be denied the right to vote for
failure to comply with such qualification, prerequisite,
standard, practice, or procedure: Provided, That such
qualification, prerequisite, standard, practice, or procedure
may be enforced without such proceeding if the qualification,
prerequisite, standard, practice, or procedure has been
submitted by the chief legal officer or other appropriate
official of such State or subdivision to the Attorney General
and the Attorney General has not interposed an objection within
sixty days after such submission, or upon good cause shown, to
facilitate an expedited approval within sixty days after such
submission, the Attorney General has affirmatively indicated
that such objection will not be made. Neither an affirmative
indication by the Attorney General that no objection will be
made, nor the Attorney General's failure to object, nor a
declaratory judgment entered under this section shall bar a
subsequent action to enjoin enforcement of such qualification,
prerequisite, standard, practice, or procedure. In the event
the Attorney General affirmatively indicates that no objection
will be made within the sixty-day period following receipt of a
submission, the Attorney General may reserve the right to
reexamine the submission if additional information comes to his
attention during the remainder of the sixty-day period which
would otherwise require objection in accordance with this
section. Any action under this section shall be heard and
determined by a court of three judges in accordance with the
provisions of section 2284 of Title 28 and any appeal shall lie
to the Supreme Court.
(b) Any voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or
standard, practice, or procedure with respect to voting that
has the purpose of or will have the effect of diminishing the
ability of any citizens of the United States on account of race
or color, or in contravention of the guarantees set forth in
section 4(f)(2), to elect their preferred candidates of choice
denies or abridges the right to vote within the meaning of
subsection (a) of this section.
(c) The term ``purpose'' in subsections (a) and (b) of this
section shall include any discriminatory purpose.
(d) The purpose of subsection (b) of this section is to
protect the ability of such citizens to elect their preferred
candidates of choice.
[Sec. 6. Whenever (a) a court has authorized the
appointment of examiners pursuant to the provisions of section
3(a), or (b) unless a declaratory judgment has been rendered
under section 4(a), the Attorney General certifies with respect
to any political subdivision named in, or included within the
scope of, determinations made under section 4(b) that (1) he
has received complaints in writing from twenty or more
residents of such political subdivision alleging that they have
been denied the right to vote under color of law on account of
race or color, or in contravention of the guarantees set forth
in section 4(f)(2), and that he believes such complaints to be
meritorious, or (2) that in his judgment (considering, among
other factors, whether the ratio of nonwhite persons to white
persons registered to vote within such subdivision appears to
him to be reasonably attributable to violations of the
fourteenth or fifteenth amendment or whether substantial
evidence exists that bona fide efforts are being made within
such subdivision to comply with the fourteenth or fifteenth
amendment), the appointment of examiners is otherwise necessary
to enforce the guarantees of the fourteenth or fifteenth
amendment, the Director of the Office of Personnel Management
shall appoint as many examiners for such subdivision as the
Director may deem appropriate to prepare and maintain lists of
persons eligible to vote in Federal, State, and local
elections. Such examiners, hearing officers provided for in
section 9(a) and other persons deemed necessary by the Director
to carry out the provisions and purposes of this Act shall be
appointed, compensated, and separated without regard to the
provisions of any statute administered by the Director of the
Office of Personnel Management, and service under this Act
shall not be considered employment for the purposes of any
statute administered by the Director of the Office of Personnel
Management, except the provisions of subchapter III of chapter
73 of title 5, United States Code, relating to political
activities: Provided, That the Director is authorized, after
consulting the head of the appropriate department or agency, to
designate suitable persons in the official service of the
United States, with their consent, to serve in these positions.
Examiners and hearing officers shall have the power to
administer oaths.
[Sec. 7. (a) The examiners for each political subdivision
shall, at such places as the Director of the Office of
Personnel Management shall by regulation designate, examine
applicants concerning their qualifications for voting. An
application to an examiner shall be in such form as the
Director may require and shall contain allegations that the
applicant is not otherwise registered to vote.
[(b) Any person whom the examiner finds, in accordance with
instructions received under Section 9(b), to have the
qualifications prescribed by State law not inconsistent with
the Constitution and laws of the United States shall promptly
be placed on a list of eligible voters. A challenge to such
listing may be made in accordance with Section 9(a) and shall
not be the basis for a prosecution under Section 12. The
examiner shall certify and transmit such list, and any
supplements as appropriate, at least once a month, to the
offices of the appropriate election officials, with copies to
the Attorney General and the attorney general of the State, and
any such lists and supplements thereto transmitted during the
month shall be available for public inspection on the last
business day of the month and in any event not later than the
forty-fifth day prior to any election. The appropriate State or
local election official shall place such names on the official
voting list. Any person whose name appears on the examiner's
list shall be entitled and allowed to vote in the election
district of his residence unless and until the appropriate
election officials shall have been notified that such person
has been removed from such list in accordance with subsection
(d) of this section: Provided, That no person shall be entitled
to vote in any election by virtue of this Act unless his name
shall have been certified and transmitted on such a list to the
offices of the appropriate election officials at least forty-
five days prior to such election.
[(c) The examiner shall issue to each person whose name
appears on such a list a certificate evidencing his eligibility
to vote.
[(d) A person whose name appears on such a list shall be
removed therefrom by an examiner if (1) such person has been
successfully challenged in accordance with the procedure
prescribed in section 9, or (2) he has been determined by an
examiner to have lost his eligibility to vote under State law
not inconsistent with the Constitution and the laws of the
United States.
[Sec. 8. Whenever an examiner is serving under this Act in
any political subdivision, the Director of the Office of
Personnel Management may assign, at the request of the Attorney
General, one or more persons, who may be officers of the United
States, (1) to enter and attend at any place for holding an
election in such subdivision for the purpose of observing
whether persons who are entitled to vote are being permitted to
vote, and (2) to enter and attend at any place for tabulating
the votes cast at any election held in such subdivision for the
purpose of observing whether votes cast by persons entitled to
vote are being properly tabulated. Such persons so assigned
shall report to an examiner appointed for such political
subdivision, to the Attorney General, and if the appointment of
examiners has been authorized pursuant to Section 3(a), to the
court.
[Sec. 9. (a) Any challenge to a listing on an eligibility
list prepared by an examiner shall be heard and determined by a
hearing officer appointed by and responsible to the Director of
the Office of Personnel Management and under such rules as the
Director shall by regulation prescribe. Such challenge shall be
entertained only if filed at such office within the State as
the Director of the Office of Personnel Management shall by
regulation designate, and within ten days after the listing of
the challenged person is made available for public inspection,
and if supported by (1) the affidavits of at least two persons
having personal knowledge of the facts constituting grounds for
the challenge, and (2) a certification that a copy of the
challenge and affidavits have been served by mail or in person
upon the person challenged at his place of residence set out in
the application. Such challenge shall be determined within
fifteen days after it has been filed. A petition for review of
the decision of the hearing officer may be filed in the United
States court of appeals for the circuit in which the person
challenged resides within fifteen days after service of such
decision by mail on the person petitioning for review but no
decision of a hearing officer shall be reversed unless clearly
erroneous. Any person listed shall be entitled and allowed to
vote pending final determination by the hearing officer and by
the court.
[(b) The times, places, procedures, and form for
application and listing pursuant to this Act and removals from
the eligibility lists shall be prescribed by regulations
promulgated by the Director of the Office of Personnel
Management and the Director shall, after consultation with the
Attorney General, instruct examiners concerning applicable
State law not inconsistent with the Constitution and laws of
the United States with respect to (1) the qualifications
required for listing, and (2) loss of eligibility to vote.
[(c) Upon the request of the applicant or the challenger or
on its own motion the Director of the Office of Personnel
Management shall have the power to require by subpoena the
attendance and testimony of witnesses and the production of
documentary evidence relating to any matter pending before the
Director under the authority of this Section. In case of
contumacy or refusal to obey a subpoena, any district court of
the United States or the United States court of any territory
or possession, or the District Court of the United States for
the District of Columbia, within the jurisdiction of which said
person guilty of contumacy or refusal to obey is found or
resides or is domiciled or transacts business, or has appointed
an agent for receipt of service of process, upon application by
the Attorney General of the United States shall have
jurisdiction to issue to such person an order requiring such
person to appear before the Director or a hearing officer,
there to produce pertinent, relevant, and nonprivileged
documentary evidence if so ordered, or there to give testimony
touching the matter under investigation; and any failure to
obey such order of the court may be punished by said court as a
contempt thereof.]
Sec. 8. (a) Whenever--
(1) a court has authorized the appointment of
observers under Section 3(a) for a political
subdivision; or
(2) the Attorney General certifies with respect to
any political subdivision named in, or included within
the scope of, determinations made under Section 4(b),
unless a declaratory judgment has been rendered under
Section 4(a), that--
(A) the Attorney General has received written
meritorious complaints from residents, elected
officials, or civic participation organizations
that efforts to deny or abridge the right to
vote under the color of law on account of race
or color, or in contravention of the guarantees
set forth in Section 4(f)(2) are likely to
occur; or
(B) in the Attorney General's judgment
(considering, among other factors, whether the
ratio of nonwhite persons to white persons
registered to vote within such subdivision
appears to the Attorney General to be
reasonably attributable to violations of the
14th or 15th amendment or whether substantial
evidence exists that bona fide efforts are
being made within such subdivision to comply
with the 14th or 15th amendment), the
assignment of observers is otherwise necessary
to enforce the guarantees of the 14th or 15th
amendment;
the Director of the Office of Personnel Management
shall assign as many observers for such subdivision as
the Director may deem appropriate.
(b) Except as provided in subSection (c), such observers
shall be assigned, compensated, and separated without regard to
the provisions of any statute administered by the Director of
the Office of Personnel Management, and their service under
this Act shall not be considered employment for the purposes of
any statute administered by the Director of the Office of
Personnel Management, except the provisions of Section 7324 of
title 5, United States Code, prohibiting partisan political
activity.
(c) The Director of the Office of Personnel Management is
authorized to, after consulting the head of the appropriate
department or agency, designate suitable persons in the
official service of the United States, with their consent, to
serve in these positions.
(d) Observers shall be authorized to--
(1) enter and attend at any place for holding an
election in such subdivision for the purpose of
observing whether persons who are entitled to vote are
being permitted to vote; and
(2) enter and attend at any place for tabulating the
votes cast at any election held in such subdivision for
the purpose of observing whether votes cast by persons
entitled to vote are being properly tabulated.
(e) Observers shall investigate and report to the Attorney
General, and if the appointment of observers has been
authorized pursuant to section 3(a), to the court.
* * * * * * *
Sec. 12. (a) Whoever shall deprive or attempt to deprive
any person of any right secured by section 2, 3, 4, 5, [7,] or
10 or shall violate section 11(a), shall be fined not more than
$5,000, or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
(b) Whoever, within a year following an election in a
political subdivision in which [an examiner has been appointed]
an observer has been assigned (1) destroys, defaces, mutilates,
or otherwise alters the marking of a paper ballot which has
been cast in such election, or (2) alters any official record
of voting in such election tabulated from a voting machine or
otherwise, shall be fined not more than $5,000, or imprisoned
not more than five years, or both.
(c) Whoever conspires to violate the provisions of
subsection (a) or (b) of this section, or interferes with any
right secured by section 2, 3, 4, 5, [7,] 10, or 11(a) shall be
fined not more than $5,000, or imprisoned not more than five
years, or both.
* * * * * * *
(e) Whenever in any political subdivision in which there
are [examiners] observers appointed pursuant to this Act any
persons alleged to such an [examiner] observer within forty-
eight hours after the closing of the polls that notwithstanding
(1) their listing under this Act or registration by an
appropriate election official and (2) their eligibility to
vote, they have not been permitted to vote in such election,
the [examiner] observer shall forthwith notify the Attorney
General if such allegations in his opinion appear to be well
founded. Upon receipt of such notification, the Attorney
General may forthwith file with the district court an
application for an order providing for the marking, casting,
and counting of the ballots of such persons and requiring the
inclusion of their votes in the total vote before the results
of such election shall be deemed final and any force or effect
given thereto. The district court shall hear and determine such
matters immediately after the filing of such application. The
remedy provided in this subsection shall not preclude any
remedy available under State or Federal law.
* * * * * * *
[Sec. 13. Listing procedures shall be terminated in any
political subdivision of any State (a) with respect to
examiners appointed pursuant to clause (b) of section 6
whenever the Attorney General notifies the Director of the
Office of Personnel Management, or whenever the District Court
for the District of Columbia determines in an action for
declaratory judgment brought by any political subdivision with
respect to which the Director of the Census has determined that
more than 50 per centum of the nonwhite persons of voting age
residing therein are registered to vote, (1) that all persons
listed by an examiner for such subdivision have been placed on
the appropriate voting registration roll, and (2) that there is
no longer reasonable cause to believe that persons will be
deprived of or denied the right to vote on account of race or
color, or in contravention of the guarantees set forth in
section 4(f)(2) in such subdivision, and (b), with respect to
examiners appointed pursuant to section 3(a), upon order of the
authorizing court. A political subdivision may petition the
Attorney General for the termination of listing procedures
under clause (a) of this section, and may petition the Attorney
General to request the Director of the Census to take such
survey or census as may be appropriate for the making of the
determination provided for in this section. The District Court
for the District of Columbia shall have jurisdiction to require
such survey or census to be made by the Director of the Census
and it shall require him to do so if it deems the Attorney
General's refusal to request such survey or census to be
arbitrary or unreasonable.]
Sec. 13. (a) The assignment of observers shall terminate in
any political subdivision of any State--
(1) with respect to observers appointed pursuant to
section 8 or with respect to examiners certified under
this Act before the date of the enactment of the Fannie
Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, and Coretta Scott King Voting
Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006,
whenever the Attorney General notifies the Director of
the Office of Personnel Management, or whenever the
District Court for the District of Columbia determines
in an action for declaratory judgment brought by any
political subdivision described in subsection (b), that
there is no longer reasonable cause to believe that
persons will be deprived of or denied the right to vote
on account of race or color, or in contravention of the
guarantees set forth in section 4(f)(2) in such
subdivision; and
(2) with respect to observers appointed pursuant to
section 3(a), upon order of the authorizing court.
(b) A political subdivision referred to in subsection
(a)(1) is one with respect to which the Director of the Census
has determined that more than 50 per centum of the nonwhite
persons of voting age residing therein are registered to vote.
(c) A political subdivision may petition the Attorney
General for a termination under subsection (a)(1).
Sec. 14. (a) * * *
(b) No court other than the District Court for the District
of Columbia [or a court of appeals in any proceeding under
section 9] shall have jurisdiction to issue any declaratory
judgment pursuant to section 4 or 5 or any restraining order or
temporary or permanent injunction against the execution or
enforcement of any provision of this Act or any action of any
Federal officer or employee pursuant hereto.
* * * * * * *
(e) In any action or proceeding to enforce the voting
guarantees of the fourteenth or fifteenth amendment, the court,
in its discretion, may allow the prevailing party, other than
the United States, a reasonable attorney's fee, reasonable
expert fees, and other reasonable litigation expenses as part
of the costs.
* * * * * * *
TITLE II--SUPPLEMENTAL PROVISIONS
* * * * * * *
BILINGUAL ELECTION REQUIREMENTS
Sec. 203. (a) * * *
(b) Bilingual Voting Materials Requirement.--
(1) Generally.--Before August 6, [2007] 2032, no
covered State or political subdivision shall provide
voting materials only in the English language.
(2) Covered states and political subdivisions.--
(A) Generally.--A State or political
subdivision is a covered State or political
subdivision for the purposes of this subsection
if the Director of the Census determines, based
on [census data] the 2010 American Community
Survey census data and subsequent American
Community Survey data in 5-year increments, or
comparable census data, that--
(i) * * *
* * * * * * *