As we in the LGBT community eagerly awaited the decisions on gay
marriage from the Supreme Court, we watched in horror as the Supremes struck
down the formula for determining which jurisdictions would have to get prior
approval before changing voter laws. Because of historic discrimination in
these identified states and cities, the U.S. Department of Justice had the
authority to challenge changes in voter laws, which would disproportionately
and negatively affect minority voters—usually meaning African Americans and
Hispanics—before they took effect.
While the Supreme Court's ruling did not render the Voter Rights
Act (originally enacted in the Lyndon Johnson administration, and recently
reauthorized by an overwhelming majority of Congress) unconstitutional in its
entirety, it did render unconstitutional the formula used to implement the
legislation. Famed civil rights leader Rep. John Lewis, got it right. He said
the Supreme Court's ruling "drove a dagger into the heart of the Voter
Rights Act."
The Supreme Court mortally wounded the Voter Rights Act in a
particularly sneaky way, ostensibly allowing the law to stand, but demanding
that the Congress update its formula for defining which jurisdictions would be
subject to its scrutiny. That task, in a Congress that can't get a
filibuster-proof majority for agreeing on what day it is, seems nearly an
impossibly high hurdle for voter justice!
So, why should a white, gay man care so much or be so horrified at
this ruling? First, because I believe in America, and the right to vote is the
cornerstone of our democracy. The Voter Rights Act is arguably the most
significant piece of civil rights legislation enacted in the last century.
Second, as a white man who grew up in the segregated South, I do
not want to live in a society that does not protect black and brown people from
the all-too-present holdovers of systemic racism. In case you were wondering if
racism is still alive in America, it took a mere two hours for
states from Texas to North Carolina to announce that, in light of the Supreme
Court ruling, they would now begin implementation of voter ID and other voter
suppression maneuvers struck down recently by the Justice Department in the
pre-decision application of the Voter Rights Act.
Third, as a gay man, this all has a familiar ring to it. Oppression
of a minority in its many forms operates in the same ways, with the same
negative effects. LGBT people know about the relentless and often insidious
ways the oppressive system reminds us that we are second class citizens. The
LGBT community should be outraged at this assault against our black and brown
brothers and sisters, a good many of whom are LGBT as well!
But we need to be more than merely outraged. We need to take to the
airwaves and the streets, along with people of color, to demand that Congress
right this wrong perpetrated on us by a conservative court. We sometimes wonder
why communities of color don't show up to support us in our
own struggle for equal rights. Perhaps it's because we don't show up to support them!
That has got to change. One of the ways an oppressive society gets to continue
its discrimination is by getting us to fight each other, rather than fight
injustice and discrimination together.
Our response to this latest injustice, coming at the hands of the
Supreme Court, could be a defining moment for the LGBT movement. It will expose
us as being "only in this for ourselves," or define us as a movement
for and about justice for all. Maybe it's time to truly add black and brown
stripes to our rainbow flag.
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