Behind Voting Rights Case, a Clash Over the Reality of Racism

erikalexi on 04 May, 2026 | No Comments

In 1965, the year Congress passed the Voting Rights Act, it did not take much detective work to discover how some of the South’s most powerful white politicians felt about their Black neighbors. Senator James Eastland, a Democrat from Mississippi who wanted to kill the landmark legislation, once openly stated that Black people were an “an inferior race.” During his 1963 inauguration speech, Gov. George C. Wallace of Alabama, a Democrat, infamously declared, “Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/03/us/politics/supreme-court-voting-rights-act.html