Via the Corner, Roger Clegg summarizes the Wall Street Journal editorial that is making an impact on the debate.
The Journal notes that “the liberal goal is to give national politicians more power to play racial politics in a few unfavored states”; that the new bill’s scheme to keep some states in federal receivership “fails to take into account broader racial progress in all of those states”; and that the bill’s use of an “effects” test raises constitutional problems and is “an open door to political abuse that is a specialty of this Administration.” All true, as is the editorial’s conclusion: that the Voting Right Act’s current provisions “provide ample federal enforcement when local politicians limit minority rights,” and so the preclearance mechanism does not need to be resurrected.