1965 Voting Rights Provisions to Expire

[AGENDA21]

NEW YORK - On what would become known as "Bloody Sunday," voting rights marchers in March 1965 reached the highest point on the Edmund Pettus Bridge near Selma, Ala., and saw a blue sea of uniforms awaiting them at the end of the bridge.

Television would show images of Alabama state troopers armed with guns, night sticks, bull whips and tear gas severely beating marchers. Days later, President Lyndon Johnson promised to bring Congress an effective voting rights bill, and that August he signed into law the Voting Rights Act of 1965, considered one of the most significant laws in the nation's history.

Now, more than four decades later, sections of the act are set to expire. The looming expiration date — Aug. 6, 2007 — has ignited debate over the provisions' effectiveness and relevance, and over whether they should be extended.

It also has generated rumors, mostly on the Internet, that black Americans will lose the right to vote en masse next year. The rumors have prompted officials at the U.S. Justice Department to post a notice on their Web site.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060331/ap_on_re_us/voting_rights_act_3

[theHandpuppet]

1. K&R an important topic

Thanks for posting this. Now more than ever we have to commit ourselves to protecting the honest vote. We've already seen that the GOP will stop at nothing to gain and maintain power by rigging elections and depriving citizens of their right to vote.

[AGENDA21]

3. Your welcome.

[Hosnon]

2. Finally!

:eyes:

It's Friday...beer me.

[Craig3410]

4. Well, IIRC,

just 2% of them blacks support * and the Repukes, so why should they resign it?


(half-:sarcasm:)

[SoCalDem]

5. They won't LOSE the right to vote, BUT

some of the other provisions in the bill will fade away and make it harder to correct "problems" that rop up with voting :(

[AGENDA21]

6. I hope your right!