Bill Text: CA AJR3 | 2021-2022 | Regular Session | Introduced

California Assembly Joint Resolution 3 (Prior Session Legislation)

Introduced

Bill Title: John Lewis Voting Rights Act.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)

Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2021-03-18 - Referred to Com. on ELECTIONS. [AJR3 Detail]

Download: California-2021-AJR3-Introduced.html

CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2021–2022 REGULAR SESSION

Assembly Joint Resolution

No. 3

Introduced by Assembly Member Cervantes

December 08, 2020

Relative to the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST

AJR 3, as introduced, Cervantes. John Lewis Voting Rights Act.

This measure would urge the United States Congress to pass, and the President of the United States to sign, the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, which would update and restore Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Fiscal Committee: NO

WHEREAS, The right to vote is among the most basic and fundamental rights of citizens of the United States, and is necessary for the continuance of a free, democratic, and representative form of government; and

WHEREAS, The scope of the franchise in the United States has expanded over time, from white, male property owners at the time of the Founding to citizens who are at least 18 years old regardless of race or sex today; and

WHEREAS, The struggle to expand the franchise has been a long and difficult one, with the work of many generations of activists helping to achieve ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1870, and the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1920; and

WHEREAS, Even after the passage of these amendments to the United States Constitution, many federal and state laws, as well as informal elections practices, had the pernicious effect of barring many Black, Indigenous, and people of color who are American citizens from being fully able to exercise their constitutional right to vote; and

WHEREAS, The Civil Rights Movement, which was led by Martin Luther King, Jr., Bayard Rustin, John Lewis, and Rosa Parks, among others, sought to dismantle Jim Crow laws in the Southern states that restricted the right to vote; and

WHEREAS, On March 7, 1965, about 600 people, including John Lewis and Amelia Boynton, engaged in a peaceful march in Alabama, which was planned to go from Selma to Montgomery, in support of securing full voting rights for all Americans, regardless of their race; and

WHEREAS, At the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, a force of Alabama state troopers, Dallas County Sheriff's deputies, and civilian vigilantes brutally attacked the peaceful marchers, which led to the hospitalization of 17 marchers and injuries to 50 others, including Boynton, who was rendered unconscious, and John Lewis, whose skull was fractured; and

WHEREAS, Among other incidents, the brutality of the violent attack at the Edmund Pettus Bridge, now known as “Bloody Sunday,” helped put pressure on the United States Congress and President Lyndon B. Johnson to pass and approve the Voting Rights Act of 1965; and

WHEREAS, For the next forty-eight years, the Voting Rights Act helped expand and protect voting rights in the United States; and

WHEREAS, Vital to the effective operation of the Voting Rights Act are Sections 4(b) and 5, which identify certain jurisdictions with a history of voting rights discrimination and subject them to “preclearance,” or federal approval, before changes in their voting laws can actually be enacted; and

WHEREAS, John Lewis was elected to represent Georgia in the United States House of Representatives in 1986; and

WHEREAS, Over the next thirty-three years, as a member of Congress, Rep. John Lewis continued his fight for social justice, civil rights, and voting rights, and was widely recognized as the “conscience of the United States Congress”; and

WHEREAS, In 2013, in Shelby County v. Holder, 570 U.S. 529, the Supreme Court of the United States struck down Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act, which renders the preclearance provision in Section 5, a key provision protecting voting rights in the United States, effectively toothless; and

WHEREAS, Rep. John Lewis declared that with the Shelby County decision, “The Supreme Court has stuck a dagger into the heart of the Voting Rights Act”; and

WHEREAS, For the last eight years, despite the urging of Rep. John Lewis and others, Congress has failed to pass a bill that would update Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act and bring it into compliance with the Supreme Court’s Shelby County decision, leaving much of the Voting Rights Act effectively inactive; and

WHEREAS, On July 17, 2020, Rep. John Lewis passed away after serving more than three decades in Congress, and upon his death, he called on American citizens to continue the fight to protect and expand voting rights; and

WHEREAS, After the passing of Rep. John Lewis, House Resolution 4, which would, among other things, update and restore Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, was renamed the “John Lewis Voting Rights Act”; now, therefore, be it

Resolved by the Assembly and the Senate of the State of California, jointly, That the Legislature calls on the United States Congress to pass, and the President of the United States to sign, the John Lewis Voting Rights Act; and be it further

Resolved, That the Chief Clerk of the Assembly transmit copies of this resolution to the President and the Vice President of the United States, to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, to the Majority Leader of the Senate, to each Senator and Representative from California in the Congress of the United States, and to the author for appropriate distribution.