Even when the Supreme Court expanded gun rights last year, it noted that banning guns at polling places remains constitutional. Yet only 12 states and the District of Columbia prohibit both open and concealed carry of firearms at the polls. A new report from the Brennan Center and Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence finds serious gaps in legal protections for voters and election workers against gun violence. It includes recommendations that are especially urgent in light of increasing political extremism. To ensure that elections remain peaceful, states must ban guns at places where votes are cast and counted and enact stronger anti-intimidation laws.
Members of Congress recently reintroduced the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would restore the Voting Rights Act to full strength. The Supreme Court has severely weakened the landmark 1965 civil rights law, opening the door to dozens of state laws making it harder to vote, particularly for people of color. The bill would modernize and repair the Voting Rights Act so it can once again provide full protection for American citizens at the ballot box.
In its new term, which started this week, the Supreme Court is likely to continue using originalism to justify radical decisions. The justices claim they’re looking at history, but real historians acknowledge the complexity of the past and the importance of context. The Court’s conservative supermajority is not following those standards.
After North Carolina Supreme Court Justice Anita Earls commented about a lack of racial diversity among the state’s judicial clerks, a state commission started an investigation. But the new inquiry isn’t into this real and significant problem — it’s investigating the justice herself for allegedly violating the state’s judicial code of conduct by speaking out. Now Earls, the court’s only Black justice, is suing in federal court to defend her First Amendment right to speak publicly on inequities in the state’s justice system.
Last week, Ohio’s political redistricting commission passed its fifth set of gerrymandered legislative maps after its four prior attempts were deemed unconstitutional by the Ohio Supreme Court. But Ohioans may get the chance to fight for reforms as soon as next year, as a proposed 2024 ballot measure would replace the existing political redistricting commission with one led by citizens.
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Virtual Event
A Supreme Court Fact-Check Thursday, October 12, 6–7 p.m. ET
The Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority has appealed to history to justify recent opinions eviscerating reproductive freedom, gun control, and affirmative action. But should history be the sole source of rights? And what if the history that the Court has relied on is flat-out wrong? Join us to examine these issues with historians Laura Edwards of Princeton University, Kate Masur of Northwestern University, and Karen Tani of the University of Pennsylvania. The discussion will be moderated by the Atlantic’s Adam Serwer. RSVP today.
Produced in partnership with the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic
