1 7 Supreme Court Cases – the right to vote Jesus Mojica History 121 Ochoa November 6, 2018 Introduction The Shelby county V. Holder, the United States V. Reese and the Ohio voter purge are Supreme Court cases which are concerned with the voting right in the United States. The United States being a federal state has to set out different voting rights in order to ensure that the voting processes are carried out efficiently in the state. These rights also define the voting in the different nations which fall under the United States federation. The three cases are therefore related since they are concerned with voting rights in the US. The Shelby county V. holder, 570 US 2 is concerned with a voting act which was passed back in the year 1965 requiring both the state and the local governments not to pass laws or voting policies that denied the American citizens their rights to vote in accordance to race among other differences among the citizens. The Supreme Court later took the case back in the year 2012 and was decided in the year 2013. The united states V. Reese, 92 US 214 case on the other hand is a case whereby the us supreme court went ahead and interpreted the 15th amendment of the us constitution which was mainly that the citizens should not be restricted of suffrage due to their race, color as well as the fact that one is a slave. This case therefore was mainly restrictions of voters voting rights due to their various differences from the other citizens. The Ohio voter purge supreme court case lastly is mainly about voter’s suppression. It was presented in the Supreme Court back last year due to voter purging in that removing the voter’s registrations which are termed as outdated. This paper therefore explains in detail these three cases that are highly recognized in the United States Supreme Court. Shelby County V. Holder As mentioned before this case is mainly regarding the appeal by the Shelby County on the voting rights act which was passed back in 1965 in the American constitution. This case dwelled on two articles in the American constitution. The first article is the section 5 of the voting rights act which requires certain states or rather counties local governments to obtain the federal clearance before changing the voting practices in their areas. The other article is the section 4(b) of the voting rights act which states the jurisdictions of the clearance process and the basis of the local government’s history on voting discrimination. This information is contained in the coverage formula in this section of the voting rights act. The district and the court of appeal courts in USA upheld the constitutionality of the two sections of the voting acts back in 2006 and 2012. The district court had reauthorized the section 5 and also the continuing of the section 4(b) coverage formula back in 2006 while the court of appeal also agreed that the section 5 was justified and the section 4(b) coverage formula continued to outdo the c.

1. 1
7
Supreme Court Cases – the right to vote
Jesus Mojica
History 121
Ochoa
November 6, 2018
Introduction
The Shelby county V. Holder, the United States V. Reese and
the Ohio voter purge are Supreme Court cases which are
concerned with the voting right in the United States. The United
States being a federal state has to set out different voting rights
in order to ensure that the voting processes are carried out
efficiently in the state. These rights also define the voting in the
different nations which fall under the United States federation.
The three cases are therefore related since they are concerned
with voting rights in the US. The Shelby county V. holder, 570
US 2 is concerned with a voting act which was passed back in
the year 1965 requiring both the state and the local governments
not to pass laws or voting policies that denied the American
citizens their rights to vote in accordance to race among other
differences among the citizens. The Supreme Court later took
the case back in the year 2012 and was decided in the year
2013.
The united states V. Reese, 92 US 214 case on the other hand is
a case whereby the us supreme court went ahead and interpreted
the 15th amendment of the us constitution which was mainly
that the citizens should not be restricted of suffrage due to their
race, color as well as the fact that one is a slave. This case
therefore was mainly restrictions of voters voting rights due to
their various differences from the other citizens. The Ohio voter

2. purge supreme court case lastly is mainly about voter’s
suppression. It was presented in the Supreme Court back last
year due to voter purging in that removing the voter’s
registrations which are termed as outdated. This paper therefore
explains in detail these three cases that are highly recognized in
the United States Supreme Court.
Shelby County V. Holder
As mentioned before this case is mainly regarding the appeal by
the Shelby County on the voting rights act which was passed
back in 1965 in the American constitution. This case dwelled on
two articles in the American constitution. The first article is the
section 5 of the voting rights act which requires certain states or
rather counties local governments to obtain the federal
clearance before changing the voting practices in their areas.
The other article is the section 4(b) of the voting rights act
which states the jurisdictions of the clearance process and the
basis of the local government’s history on voting
discrimination. This information is contained in the coverage
formula in this section of the voting rights act. The district and
the court of appeal courts in USA upheld the constitutionality of
the two sections of the voting acts back in 2006 and 2012. The
district court had reauthorized the section 5 and also the
continuing of the section 4(b) coverage formula back in 2006
while the court of appeal also agreed that the section 5 was
justified and the section 4(b) coverage formula continued to
outdo the constitutional congregate. The Supreme Court later in
November 2012 granted to hear the case under the limited
question of whether the decision of the congress to reauthorize
the section 5 under the coverage formula in the section 4(b) was
beyond its authority and hence was against the tenth amendment
of the article iv of the united states constitution.
According to the oral arguments presented to the Supreme
Court by various justices in the Supreme Court presented the
reauthorization by the congress back in 2006 as unconstitutional
and therefore suggested that the racial discrimination in the
voting rights was prevalent. The Supreme Court therefore in

3. may 2013 ruled on the section 4 (b) of the coverage formula
being unconstitutional with a 5 to 4 vote on the Shelby county
V. Holder. Five of the Supreme Court judges proposed that the
section 4(b) article of the voting rights showed some level of
racial discrimination in voting of different counties in the
United States. The coverage formula was also ruled to be
unconstitutional since it dwelled on 40 years ago data which
was outdated and did not responsive to the current activities in
the United States. The coverage formula was also termed by the
Supreme Court ruling to be unresponsive to the current needs of
the states or rather local governments in the counties as well the
American citizens. The article was therefore impermissible of
the constitutional federalism principles as well as equal
sovereignty to the states in USA. However the Supreme Court
did not over rule the section 5 of the voting rights act.
Nevertheless this section dwelled much on the section 4(b) and
therefore no jurisdiction would be passed since the section 4(b)
had been considered unconstitutional. The Shelby County V.
Holder 570 US 2 (2013) case therefore helped in curbing racial
entitlement or rather discrimination in voting rights for some of
the states in the united sates. This is mainly because years later
after the Supreme Court ruling on this case most of the counties
have adjusted their voting practices with most of them removing
rations such as same day registration, pre registration for teens
as well as online voting registration among other provisions.
Many polling places also closed down in various states after the
Supreme Court ruling on this case. Currently the states are not
required to obtain federal clearance since various amendments
that enable each American citizen to exercise their voting rights
have been passed.
United States V. Reese
The United States V. Reese is a case ruled by the US Supreme
Court back in the year (1876). This case is mainly based on the
interpretation of the 15th amendment of the United States
constitution. This amendment makes sure that the suffrage of
the American citizens on their voting rights not being restricted

4. due to their race or color. This case was the first case regarding
the voting rights under the 15th amendment that the Supreme
Court handled. The case was mainly regarding an electoral
official from Kentucky who failed to register William garner an
American citizen of the African descent vote in a municipal
election. The election had been brought forward to the Supreme
Court after the judges in the circuit courts in the Kentucky
district had a division in their opinions. According to the
Supreme Court the act of failing to register ones vote due to
their color, race or any other condition of servitude is against
the 15th amendment of the United States constitution. The 15th
amendment does not bestow with the right to suffrage of the
citizens however it invests the citizens with the right to
exemption from discrimination in electoral processes. The chief
justice Mr. Waite of the Supreme Court therefore according to
his ruling dismissed ruling of the circuit courts on this in
respect to the 15th amendment. The judge also stipulated that
the congress did not define the legislation for one failing to
register ones vote due to their race or color.
The Supreme Court ruling was also based on the power of the
congress to legislate upon the subject of elections which is also
contained by the 15th amendment of the United States
constitution. This case brought a lot of impacts in the United
States because after the ruling by the Supreme Court most of the
states in America started developing various means of excluding
the black the Americans of the African descent from voting.
These states kept these actions within the constraint of the 14th
amendment of the United States constitution. Poll taxes and
literacy tests were introduced in different in order to exclude
the blacks from participating in the electoral process in the US
back in the year 1890. Most of the blacks in American back then
were poor and therefore lacked the money to pay for the poll
taxes and most of them were also illiterate this therefore made it
easier for them to be denied their voting rights back then unlike
nowadays where most of them are literate and also various
amendment of the united states constitution have been made

5. hence allowing most black Americans to exercise their voting
rights.
Ohio voter purge Supreme Court case
This is a case concerning voter purging that was presented to
the United States Supreme Court earlier this year. This court
ruled in favor of the ending of the voter purging with five of the
judges proposing the doing away with voter purging and four
others opposing. The decision concentrated in extensive part on
specialized elucidations of government casting ballot laws, in
spite of the fact that the contention fundamental Ohio's
framework a lot greater one about voter concealment. The Ohio
system is mainly a methods for expelling voter enlistments that
the state feels are obsolete from its rolls driving somebody to
need to enroll by and by to cast a ballot. Ohio system has a
system of dealing with voter purging. First, it trusts that
somebody will not vote for two years. At that point it sends
them a prepaid return card to ensure the eventual voter still
lives at a similar location. On the off chance that the state does
not recover the card and the individual does not cast a ballot in
any decision for four more years, the state expect the individual
has moved and expels the individual's voter enlistment from the
rolls, referring to a difference in habitation? Adversaries of the
framework contend that it abuses the government National
Voter Enlistment Act and Help America Vote Act, which
confine a state from expelling somebody from the rolls on the
grounds that the individual neglected to cast a ballot.
Adversaries additionally guarantee that the framework is
absurd, to some extent on the grounds that numerous individuals
who got the arrival cards basically discarded them without
reacting — not on the grounds that they never again live at the
habitations, but since they might not have recognized what the
cards were for. The Preeminent Court's Husted v. A. Philip
Randolph Organization administering closed, in any case, that
Ohio's voter cleanse framework did not damage government
laws. The Court found that Ohio's framework utilizes an
absence of casting a ballot as only one bit of proof, alongside

6. the absence of reaction to the prepaid return card, to trigger a
man's expulsion from the rolls. Since a man not casting a ballot
isn't the sole reason for expulsion from the rolls, the Court
stated, it's lawful under government law. The Court additionally
said that the framework is, lawfully, sensible. "Ohio's procedure
can't be absurd since it utilizes the difference in living
arrangement proof that Congress said it could: the inability to
send back a notice combined with the inability to vote in favor
of the imperative time frame. Ohio's procedure is as needs be
legitimate," the Court found. While a significant part of the
decision centers on how to peruse and translate government law,
the more extensive open discussion is about whether Ohio's
framework is one more endeavor to stifle voters. In the course
of recent years, Republican-controlled state governments have
found a way to make casting a ballot harder — moves that,
Democrats and social liberties activists contend, have made it
more troublesome for minority and Law based voters
specifically to cast their votes. The Ohio has greatly impacted
in ensuring the voting rights of each American citizen are
upheld in accordance to the current United States constitution.
Conclusion
These three cases are quite important in the judicial history or
rather the whole history of the united states since they have
played a vital role in ensuring that proper and up to date
provisions have been made in order for every single citizen in
the united states exercises their voting rights. These cases have
also helped in curbing racial discrimination in elections and that
each individual respects the rights of the other. The electoral
congress has also improved to meet the current needs of each
state and legislations have also been put in place in accordance
with the law.
References
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