On Wednesday, Shelby County, Ala., will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to kill the Voting Rights Act before its work is done. If the Court agrees with Shelby County, it will be a devastating backward step in this nation’s history. Fortunately, there is good reason to believe the court won’t follow Shelby County’s road.
A hundred years ago, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes lamented how little courts and lawsuits could do to combat voting discrimination in the South. He said the solution for such an injury to the democratic process must come from "the legislative and political department of the government of the United States."
