The Supreme Court’s decision yesterday in Louisiana v Callais, which effectively guts the one remaining section of the Voting Rights Act, is a blatantly racist attack on Black people that will hurt all workers. As a result of this decision, Black voters and other voters of color will be disenfranchised, and anti-labor politicians will find it even easier to gerrymander their way into permanent majorities.
The Voting Rights Act, one of the most significant legislative achievements of the Civil Rights Movement, was passed because state legislatures, especially in the South, were systematically disenfranchising Black voters. In 2013, the right-wing majority on the Supreme Court eviscerated most of its provisions. With this decision an even more right-wing court has, in the words of dissenting Justice Elena Kagan, accomplished a “demolition” of the Act.
As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. famously noted, the enemies of racial justice and the enemies of labor are “virtually always” one and the same, “a twin-headed creature” spewing both racist epithets and anti-labor propaganda. The vast majority of Black people are workers, and Black voters are the most reliably pro-labor part of the electorate. By stripping Black voters of their right to equitable representation in Congress, the Supreme Court has made it even harder for working people to win legislation to protect our rights and provide decent healthcare, education, and housing for our families.
Like the National Labor Relations Act which guarantees our right to form unions, the Voting Rights Act was won through struggle, including non-violent civil disobedience. Following the infamous “Bloody Sunday” in Selma, Alabama, in which state troopers and other law enforcement beat, hosed, and tear-gassed 600 unarmed marchers, President Lyndon B. Johnson demanded that Congress pass the Act. The Court’s demolition of the Act dishonors the sacrifice of those who suffered, bled, and in some cases died for civil rights.
Faced with a Supreme Court and a political system hostile to both working people and people of color, we must reclaim this legacy of struggle. One of the three core demands of tomorrow’s May Day demonstrations is “Hands Off Our Vote.” We urge all working people to join us in the streets tomorrow to defend our democracy, resist racist gerrymandering, and insist that our country prioritize “Workers Over Billionaires.”
Scott Slawson
General President
Andrew Dinkelaker
Secretary-Treasurer
Kimberly Lawson
Director of Organization