Blog of Rights
Laughlin
McDonald
03/18/2011

A Jury of One's Peers

By Laughlin McDonald, Voting Rights Project at 11:20am

The ACLU has worked over the years to remove barriers to women serving on juries. Under English common law, which was the basis for early American law, women, except in a small category of cases, were deemed unfit to serve on juries under the doctrine of propter defectum sexus, a "defect of sex."

The Supreme Court, in an 1879 decision, confirmed that a state may constitutionally "confine the selection [of jurors] to males." Utah, in 1898, became the first state to deem women qualified for jury duty; but as of 1927, only 19 states allowed women to serve. Aside from the "defect of sex," women were excluded from juries for a variety of reasons: their primary obligation was to their families and children; they should be shielded from hearing the details of criminal cases, particularly those involving sex offenses; they would be too sympathetic to persons accused of crimes; and keeping male and female jurors together during long trials could be injurious to women.

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02/26/2013
Voting Rights Act

Why The Voting Rights Act Matters

By Laughlin McDonald, Voting Rights Project & Eunice Hyon Min Rho, ACLU at 11:19am

During the signing ceremony of the Voting Rights Act, President Lyndon B. Johnson characterized the law as "one of the most monumental laws in the entire history of American freedom." Since that day, this landmark civil rights law has steadily and surely defeated and deterred countless discriminatory and varied barriers to the ballot.

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03/06/2013
Voting Rights Act

Don't Strike Down Section 5

By Laughlin McDonald, Voting Rights Project at 5:20pm

Hans von Spakovsky, in his recent article in the National Review, “Strike Down Section 5,” gets it wrong when he says the Supreme Court should hold Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act unconstitutional in the case now pending before it, Shelby County, Alabama v. Holder. The South, as a direct result of the Voting Rights Act, has changed, but that does not mean we no longer need Section 5, which requires nine states and parts of seven others with the worst and continuing histories of discrimination in voting to preclear their proposed changes in voting and show that they do not have a discriminatory purpose or effect.

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03/07/2011

Voting in Florida: From Bad to Worse

By Laughlin McDonald, Voting Rights Project at 3:37pm

Wilbertine Berkley is one of hundreds of thousands of Floridians with past felony convictions whose voting rights are in peril. After struggling with substance abuse, Wilbertine has served her time, enrolled in college and become a volunteer with a homelessness organization in her community. She's overcome more obstacles than many of us, but after four years, she's still waiting to have her voting rights reinstated, lost amidst the backlog of over 100,000 rights restoration cases yet to be acted upon by the Florida Board of Executive Clemency.

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10/29/2008

Keep an Eye Out for Voter Suppression

By Laughlin McDonald, Voting Rights Project at 3:00pm

(Originally posted on Daily Kos.)

It seems each day brings a new story about allegations of fraud during ACORN's voter registration drives. But what is often left out is that there is absolutely no credible evidence that phony registrations translate into fraudulent votes. Mickey Mouse or Donald Duck might be registered, but neither is likely to show up to vote on Election Day. But while voter registration fraud does not threaten the integrity of this election, there is a very real concern that widespread voter suppression does.

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10/16/2008

Preparing for the 2008 Election: If You See Something, Say Something

By Laughlin McDonald, Voting Rights Project at 10:29am
voting rights

The 2008 general election is upon us, and if the past is prelude to the future, some things will go wrong. Undoubtedly some of the things that went wrong in the past might reoccur this November. This isn't a complete list of what can go wrong, but keep an eye out for:

  • Poll-watching activities that go beyond mere observation and become harassment
  • Disinformation campaigns
  • Moving polling places on short notice or without sufficient warning
  • Polling place issues like unusual hours, lack of access to centralized voter registration records, problems in casting provisional ballots, understaffed or untrained poll workers.
  • Malfunctioning voting machines, caused by human errors and/or flawed technology.
  • "Caging" of minority voters - sending them do-not-forward letters so that if returned they can be used to challenge them as nonresidents.
  • Unfounded accusations of fraud in minority voter registration designed to remove minorities from the voter rolls and deter turnout on Election Day.
  • The wrongful purging of voters from the registration rolls.
  • Not allowing people to vote who were in line before the polls closed.

Although this list is long, there are many things we can do to help ensure a fair election.

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