The original content of Democracy Now! Headlines appears under the Creative
Commons BY-NC-ND 3.0 License (United States). For more, including their other
shows and media, visit www.democracynow.org.
May 31, 2012

Holder: Civil Rights Gains "Hang in the Balance" in Voting Struggle 
--------------------------------------------------------------------


 
The news of the Florida voter purge follows a wave of voter ID laws that
have passed in multiple states as part of what some see as a bid to
disenfranchise Democratic voters ahead of the election. On Wednesday,
Attorney General Eric Holder discussed the attack on voting rights in an
address to African-American lawmakers and church leaders in Washington.

Eric Holder: "Despite our nation’s long history of extending voting
rights to non-property owners and to women, to people of color, to
Native Americans, and to younger Americans, today a growing number of
our fellow citizens are worried about the same disparities, divisions
and problems that nearly five decades ago so many fought to address. In
my travels across this country, I’ve heard a consistent drumbeat of
concern from citizens who, for the first time in their lives, now have
reason to believe that we are failing to live up to one of our
nation’s most noble ideals and some of the achievements that defined
the civil rights movement now hang, again, in the balance.”

 

.