Mississippi to vote on Jim Crow-era law designed to secure 'white supremacy' in state politics

[mucifer]

Mississippi voters have never elected a Black candidate to statewide office, despite having the largest proportional Black population of any U.S. state at nearly 40%.

Advocates hope an amendment on the November ballot may change that.

Mississippi is the only state with a multistep process for electing statewide positions like governor, attorney general and secretary of state. Its electoral college-like voting system was designed by white framers in Southern Reconstruction with the intent to disenfranchise minority voters and uphold white power in politics.

A candidate in a Mississippi statewide election first must win the popular vote and then win a majority of the state's 122 House of Representatives districts -- 42 of which are majority Black. If no candidate wins both the popular vote and the electoral vote, the race is decided by the Mississippi Legislature. As with the electoral college in a presidential election, representatives are not obligated to vote with their districts.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/mississippi-vote-jim-crow-era-law-designed-secure/story?id=72862667

[intrepidity]

1. Similar enough to our National (EC) system

that it, too, should be modified.

[customerserviceguy]

2. I'm a bit surprised

that the Voting Rights Act didn't deal with this byzantine system decades ago.