She said the focus of the Voting Rights Act had properly changed from “first-generation barriers to ballot access” to “second-generation barriers” like racial gerrymandering and laws requiring at-large voting in places with a sizable black minority. She said the law had been effective in thwarting such efforts. 
 
 The law had applied to nine states — Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia — and to scores of counties and municipalities in other states, including Brooklyn, Manhattan and the Bronx. 
 
 Chief Justice Roberts wrote that Congress remained free to try to impose federal oversight on states where voting rights were at risk, but must do so based on contemporary data. But the chances that the current Congress could reach agreement on where federal oversight is required are small, most analysts say. 
 
 Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. joined the majority opinion. Justice Ginsburg was joined in dissent by Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. 
 
 The majority held that the coverage formula in Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, originally passed in 1965 and most recently updated by Congress in 1975, was unconstitutional. The section determined which states must receive clearance from the Justice Department or a federal court in Washington before they made minor changes to voting procedures, like moving a polling place, or major ones, like redrawing electoral districts. 
 
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 Section 5, which sets out the preclearance requirement, was originally scheduled to expire in five years. Congress repeatedly extended it: for five years in 1970, seven years in 1975, and 25 years in 1982. Congress renewed the act in 2006 after holding extensive hearings on the persistence of racial discrimination at the polls, again extending the preclearance requirement for 25 years. But it relied on data from the 1975 reauthorization to decide which states and localities were covered. 
 
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 The current coverage system, Chief Justice Roberts wrote, is “based on 40-year-old facts having no logical relationship to the present day.” 
 
 “Congress — if it is to divide the states — must identify those jurisdictions to be singled out on a basis that makes sense in light of current conditions,” he wrote. “It cannot simply rely on the past.” 
 
 The decision did not strike down Section 5, but without Section 4, the later section is without significance — unless Congress passes a new bill for determining which states would be covered. 
 
 It was hardly clear, at any rate, that the court’s conservative majority would uphold Section 5 if the question returned to the court in the unlikely event that Congress enacted a new coverage formula. In a concurrence, Justice Thomas called for striking down Section 5 immediately, saying that the majority opinion had provided the reasons and had merely left “the inevitable conclusion unstated.” 
 
 The Supreme Court had repeatedly upheld the law in earlier decisions, saying that the preclearance requirement was an effective tool to combat the legacy of lawless conduct by Southern officials bent on denying voting rights to blacks. 
 
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 Critics of Section 5 say it is a unique federal intrusion on state sovereignty and a badge of shame for the affected jurisdictions that is no longer justified. 
 
 The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was one of the towering legislative achievements of the civil rights movement, and Chief Justice Roberts said its “strong medicine” was the right response to “entrenched racial discrimination.” When it was first enacted, he said, black voter registration stood at 6.4 percent in Mississippi, and the gap between black and white registration rates was more than 60 percentage points. 
 
 In the 2004 election, the last before the law was reauthorized, the black registration rate in Mississippi was 76 percent, almost four percentage points higher than the white rate. In the 2012 election, Chief Justice Roberts wrote, “African-American voter turnout exceeded white voter turnout in five of the six states originally covered by Section 5.” 
 
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 The chief justice recalled the Freedom Summer of 1964, when the civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner were murdered near Philadelphia, Miss., while seeking to register black voters. He mentioned Bloody Sunday in 1965, when police officers beat marchers in Selma, Ala. 
 
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 “Today,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote, “both of those towns are governed by African-American mayors. Problems remain in these states and others, but there is no denying that, due to the Voting Rights Act, our nation has made great strides.” 
 
 Justice Ginsburg, in her dissent from the bench, drew a different lesson from those events, drawing on the words of Dr. King. 
 
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 “The great man who led the march from Selma to Montgomery and there called for the passage of the Voting Rights Act foresaw progress, even in Alabama,” she said. “ ‘The arc of the moral universe is long,’ he said, but ‘it bends toward justice,’ if there is a steadfast commitment to see the task through to completion.” 
 
 In her written dissent, Justice Ginsburg said that Congress was the right body to decide whether the law was still needed and where. Congress reauthorized the law in 2006 by large majorities; the vote was 390 to 33 in the House and unanimous in the Senate. President George W. Bush, a Republican, signed the bill into law, saying it was “an example of our continued commitment to a united America where every person is valued and treated with dignity and respect.” 
 
 The Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of the 2006 extension of the law in a 2009 decision, Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District Number One v. Holder. But it avoided answering the central question, and it seemed to give Congress an opportunity to make adjustments. Congress, Chief Justice Roberts noted on Tuesday, did not respond. 
 
 Justice Ginsburg suggested in her dissent that an era had drawn to a close with the court’s decision on the Voting Rights Act, in Shelby County v. Holder, No. 12-96. 
 
 “Beyond question, the V.R.A. is no ordinary legislation,” she wrote. “It is extraordinary because Congress embarked on a mission long delayed and of extraordinary importance: to realize the purpose and promise of the Fifteenth Amendment,” the Reconstruction-era amendment that barred racial discrimination in voting and authorized Congress to enforce it. 
 
 “For a half century,” she wrote, “a concerted effort has been made to end racial discrimination in voting. Thanks to the Voting Rights Act, progress once the subject of a dream has been achieved and continues to be made.” 
 
 “The court errs egregiously,” she concluded, “by overriding Congress’s decision.” ||||| Voting Procedures: A lawyer for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund talks about arguing in favor of the Voting Rights Act at the Supreme Court. 
 
 WASHINGTON — A central provision of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 may be in peril, judging from tough questioning on Wednesday from the Supreme Court ’s more conservative members. 
 
 If the court overturns the provision, nine states, mostly in the South, would become free to change voting procedures without first getting permission from federal officials. 
 
 In a vivid argument in which the lawyers and justices drew varying lessons from the legacies of slavery, the Civil War and the civil rights movement, the court’s conservative wing suggested that the modern South had outgrown its troubled past and that the legal burdens on the nine states were no longer justified. 
 
 Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. asked skeptically whether “the citizens in the South are more racist than citizens in the North.” Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, whose vote is probably crucial, asked whether Alabama today is an “independent sovereign” or whether it must live “under the trusteeship of the United States government.” 
 
 Justice Antonin Scalia said the law, once a civil rights landmark, now amounted to a “perpetuation of racial entitlement.” 
 
 That remark created the sharpest exchange of the morning, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor on the other end. “Do you think that the right to vote is a racial entitlement?” she later asked a lawyer challenging the law, with an edge in her voice that left little doubt she was responding to Justice Scalia’s statement. “Do you think that racial discrimination in voting has ended, that there is none anywhere?” 
 
 The outcome of the case will most likely remain in doubt until the end of the court’s current term, in June. Many legal observers predicted that the justices would overturn part of the voting law in 2009, when the court had the same conservative-leaning majority, only to be proven wrong. 
 
 One important change, however, is that Chief Justice Roberts suggested in the 2009 ruling that Congress update its formula to determine which parts of the country should remain subject to the law. Congress has not done so. 
 
 The question at the heart of Wednesday’s argument was whether Congress, in reauthorizing the provision for 25 years in 2006, was entitled to use a formula based on historic practices and voting data from elections held decades ago. 
 
 Should the court strike down the law’s central provision, it would be easier for lawmakers in the nine states to enact the kind of laws Republicans in several states have recently advocated, including tighter identification standards. It would also give those states more flexibility to move polling places and redraw legislative districts. 
 
 The four members of the court’s liberal wing, citing data and history, argued that Congress remained entitled to make the judgment that the provision was still needed in the covered jurisdictions. The law passed the Senate unanimously and House overwhelmingly, by a vote of 390 to 33 in 2006. 
 
 “It’s an old disease,” Justice Stephen G. Breyer said of efforts to thwart minority voting. “It’s gotten a lot better. A lot better. But it’s still there.” 
 
 Justice Kennedy said that history taught a different lesson, referring to the reconstruction of Europe after World War II. “The Marshall Plan was very good, too,” he said. “But times change.” 
 
 Justice Breyer looked to a different conflict. 
 
 “What do you think the Civil War was about?” he asked. “Of course it was aimed at treating some states differently than others.” He also said that the nation lived through 200 years of slavery and 80 years of racial segregation. 
 
 Debo P. Adegbile, a lawyer with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which joined the government in defending the law, echoed that point. “This statute is in part about our march through history to keep promises that our Constitution says for too long were unmet,” he said. 
 
 The law was challenged by Shelby County, Ala., which said that its federal preclearance requirement, in Section 5 of the law, had outlived its usefulness and that it imposed an unwarranted badge of shame on the affected jurisdictions. 
 
 The county’s lawyer, Bert W. Rein, said that “the problem to which the Voting Rights Act was addressed is solved.” ||||| Note: We originally posted this primer on the Voting Rights Act case back in February when the Supreme Court was hearing arguments. We've updated it in light of the court's Tuesday decision. 
 
 The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that a key component of the 1965 Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional. Below is everything you need to know about the decision. 
 
 What exactly did the court rule? 
 
 In a 5-4 decision, the court decided that Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional. Section 4 dictates which parts of the country must receive pre-clearance before election laws can be changed there (more on that below). 
 
 “Section 4’s formula is unconstitutional in light of current conditions,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote. “Coverage today is based on decades-old data and eradicated practices.” 
 
 So in a nutshell, it will fall to Congress to come up with a new formula based on current conditions for figuring out which jurisdictions should be subject to pre-clearance. 
 
 Shelby County v. Holder 
 
 Back up a second. What is the Voting Rights Act? 
 
 Signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965, the sweeping legislation was designed to prevent racially discriminatory voting practices. 
 
 
 
 President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act. (AP) 
 
 You mentioned Section 4. What is Section 5? There was a lot of buzz about that leading up to Tuesday's decision. 
 
 This is the part of the Voting Rights Act that makes it legal for areas with a history of racial discrimination to receive pre-clearance from the Justice Department or a federal court before making any voting law changes. The court did not pass judgement on Section 5 Tuesday, which means the Justice Department still has authority to decide which jurisdictions need pre-clearance. But the existing formula can no longer be used to decide which areas those are. So the reality is that absent new guidelines from Congress, Section 5 doesn't apply anywhere moving forward. 
 
 
 
 U.S. Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), left, and the Rev. Al Sharpton attend a voters rights rally in front of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington on Feb. 27. (Gary Cameron/Reuters) 
 
 Which states have been subject to Section 5? 
 
 Alabama, which was the subject of the Supreme Court case, and eight other complete states as well as some other selected jurisdictions elsewhere have been subject to Section 5. Most of the the states are in the South. In light of Tuesday's decision, these areas effectively no longer require pre-clearance. 
 
 
 
 (U.S. Justice Department) 
 
 Over the years, Congress has reauthorized Section 5 several times, most recently in 2006. 
 
 Why did opponents of Section 5 say? 
 
 They say that it is outdated. “The violence, intimidation and subterfuge that led Congress to pass Section 5 and this court to uphold it no longer remains,” said the Shelby County challenge. And as NPR noted, the formula still relies on election data from 1972. Tuesday's court decision involved Shleby County, Alabama. Shelby County Attorney Frank Ellis explained the opposition in this CBS News report: 
 
 What about supporters? 
 
 They believe it’s still a necessary preventive measure against changes to voter ID laws, district lines and other adjustments that could threaten the rights of minority voters. President Obama, who believes Section 5 should be kept in place, summed it up like this in an interview with Joe Madison of SiriusXM Radio: 
 
 What’s next? 
 
 All eyes will be on Congress. The question is whether lawmakers will come up with a new formula to decide which areas will be subject to pre-clearance under Section 5. 
 
 "We issue no holding on §5 itself, only on the coverage formula. Congress may draft another formula based on current conditions," reads Tuesday's decision. 
 
 Based on the major disagreements seizing Congress these days, there is no reason to expect accord on the matter anytime soon, though. ||||| BY Celeste Katz 
 
 Reactions to the split Supreme Court ruling on Shelby County V. Holder, the case regarding Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, are flooding in. We'll have rolling updates. More for you here in an earlier item, but the crux of the case are the protections set in place and repeatedly reaffirmed by the SCOTUS to protect minority voters from discrimination. These protections include New York, though mostly Southern states are affected. 
 
 Reaffirmations of the VRA have been required as the country and Court consider whether the nation has made progress toward equal rights that would allow adjustments in the requirements the federal government sets on the states. Civil rights groups and advocates are sounding an alarm, saying that if federal monitoring is eased, states could institute policies of their own that set back the clock. 
 
 A sampling of reactions to the 5-4 ruling: 
 
 Jon Greenbaum, Chief Counsel, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (which represented Shelby County resident Bobby Lee Harris in the case): “The Supreme Court has effectively gutted one of the nation's most important and effective civil rights laws. Minority voters in places with a record of discrimination are now at greater risk of being disenfranchised than they have been in decades. Today's decision is a blow to democracy. Jurisdictions will be able to enact policies which prevent minorities from voting, and the only recourse these citizens will have will be expensive and time-consuming litigation.” 
 
 Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand: “The Voting Rights Act has been a cornerstone of ensuring the rights won in the Civil Rights movement continue to stand strong today. The Supreme Court’s ruling is a significant setback that will put Congress to the test of whether we can move quickly and without partisanship. I urge my colleagues to meet that test. 
 
 
 
 “We must be clear -- The Voting Rights Act is not ancient history. Just last year alone, Section 5 helped prevent discrimination across the country – on issues ranging from state ID’s to redistricting and reducing early voting. Voting is a sacred right and ensuring that every vote counts is a cornerstone of our democracy that must be embraced by both sides of the aisle. The last time Congress reauthorized the Voting Rights Act in 2006, it was passed for the fourth time with sweeping bipartisan majorities in both houses of Congress. We must come together once again to ensure that every American has the fundamental right to vote regardless of which community they live in.” 
 
 New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman: “The Supreme Court’s decision to strike down Section 4 is deeply disappointing, and Congress must act immediately to develop a new coverage provision that will ensure equal access to the political process for every American. While the Supreme Court has preserved the preclearance process of Section 5, it is now the responsibility of Congress to ensure that the Voting Rights Act continues to play its vital role in strengthening our democracy and combating and deterring voting discrimination.” 
 
 NYC Public Advocate Bill de Blasio*: “Americans have bled and died for the right to vote. The Supreme Court’s willful amnesia of that struggle is a complete disgrace. To this court, the ability of a state to impede people from voting is somehow more important than a citizen’s fundamental right to vote. Minority communities and civil rights leaders fought too hard and too long to see progress undone. We’re going to fight it in legislatures and at the grassroots until these basic rights are restored.” (*Candidate for mayor; statement was sent via government office.) 
 
 NYC Comptroller John Liu*: "This is a devastating blow to the core of fundamental voting rights. The great strides made in recent decades are precisely due to the Voting Rights Act and the hard-fought protections it afforded to ensure fairness and participation for the civil rights of millions of Americans. Such protections are especially needed today against the tide of voter suppression measures that have shockingly intensified in recent years. The right to vote is too critical and too much is at stake to be left so unprotected, and we urge Congress to take action." (*Candidate for mayor; statement was sent via government office.) 
 
 Benjamin Todd Jealous, President and CEO, NAACP: “This decision is outrageous. The Court’s majority put politics over decades of precedent and the rights of voters. Congress must resurrect its bipartisan efforts from 2006 to ensure that the federal government has the power to preemptively strike racially discriminatory voting laws. Without that power, we are more vulnerable to the flood of attacks we have seen in recent years. While Section 2 is powerful after the fact, we must have a tool to protect against stolen elections proactively.” 
 
 Wade Henderson, President and CEO, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights: "Today’s decision is a setback to our democracy and the voting rights of real Americans. We can’t allow discrimination at the ballot box and must prevent minorities from having their votes purged, packed, gerrymandered, and redistricted away. No one should be fooled by the Pollyannaish fantasy that voting discrimination no longer exists . As the Court acknowledged, voting discrimination still exists and Congress may draft another coverage formula. We urge Congress to act with urgency and on a bipartisan basis to protect voting rights for minorities." 
 
 Rev. Al Sharpton: “This is a devastating blow to Americans, particularly African-Americans, who are now at the mercy of state governments. Given last year’s attempts by states to change voting rules, it is absurd to say that we do not need these protections. National Action Network and I will mobilize nationwide to put the pressure on Congress to come with stricter voter protection laws. The National Action to Realize the Dream march that I announced yesterday with Dr. King’s son and daughter in Washington for the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington, will now be centered around the protection and restoring of voter protection. This ruling has in effect revoked one of Dr. King’s greatest achievements, the teeth of the Voting Rights Acts.” 
 
 Project 21: "Federalism and state sovereignty are the big winners today -- and, once again, Eric Holder's Justice Department was the loser. Fundamentally, the position put forward by Justice Department, if accepted, would have created all kinds of distortions that our nation's founders never intended. We all support voting rights, but the quest for voting rights shouldn't come at the expense of preventing voter fraud nor the equal rights of states." (Project 21, a black conservatives group, filed an amicus brief in Shelby V. Holder.) 
 
 Brennan Center for Justice President Michael Waldman: “The Supreme Court’s decision is at odds with recent history. The Voting Rights Act was vital in 2012, not just 1965. For nearly five decades, it has been the nation’s most effective tool to eradicate racial discrimination in voting. And it is still critical today. Last year, Section 5 helped block laws making it harder to vote. There is a path forward. Section 5 stands. Congress now has the duty to upgrade this key protection and ensure our elections remain free, fair, and accessible for all Americans.” 
 
 Alliance for Justice President Nan Aron: "Today, by overturning a crucial part of the Voting Rights Act, five justices betrayed the principles of justice and fairness embodied in this law for half a century—and showed a callous disregard for the realities still faced by people of color. Congress must now act without delay to restore the power of the Voting Rights Act to serve as a bulwark against persistent discrimination." 
 
 Ilyse Hogue, president, NARAL Pro-Choice America: We believe that participation in the political process is a constitutional right that empowers Americans to elect leaders who represent their interests in important areas such as reproductive rights. With this dangerous decision, many voters will have no protection from schemes that could aggravate the tragic disenfranchisement that sparked the civil rights movement. It is my sincere hope that Congress will summon the political will to build a new system for protecting the rights of all voters and reinforce the safeguards provided by the Voting Rights Act, without delay.” 
 
 Mexican American Legislative Caucus Chairman Trey Martinez Fischer (Texas House of Representatives): "While we are pleased that the court did not strike down Section 5, we are disappointed that the coverage formula was deemed unconstitutional. We urge Congress to develop a new coverage formula that complies with the Supreme Court’s ruling in order to place states with a history of discrimination towards minorities under preclearance protections. One needs only to look at the D.C. District Court’s opinion in the Texas redistricting and the photo identification cases to see that discrete protections for minority voters in Texas are still critically necessary. We intend to continue to use these judicial findings of discrimination as our case proceeds." 
 
 Communications Workers Of America: "Today’s decision by the U.S. Supreme Court damages the Voting Rights Act and is a step backward for the right to vote in this country and for democracy. The Court maintained that it didn’t invalidate the requirement that communities like Shelby County [have] have changes to voting procedures pre-approved by the federal government. But by declaring the process used to determine which state and local governments must comply to be unconstitutional, the Court for now has eliminated the protections of the Voting Rights Act for millions of Americans." 
 
 National Education Association President Dennis Van Roekel: “We are dismayed by the Supreme Court’s ruling today, which effectively paralyzes one of the key provisions of the Voting Rights Act. Unfortunately, the opinion gives credence to the myth that our nation has achieved racial parity. Our biggest fear is not only that we will stop achieving equality, but more importantly, that we will lose ground. For those of us who have devoted our lives to fighting for social justice—especially for those of us who do so from the schoolhouse or the college campus—the thought is especially troubling... We urge Congress to move immediately toward re-enacting Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act with a formula that reflects the unfortunate current reality that racial discrimination still exists at the polls and elsewhere in the fabric of many communities.”
– The Supreme Court dealt what looks like a mortal wound to the Voting Rights Act today, striking down the law's key enforcement metric. The court did not, as some had expected, strike down Section 5, which gives the federal government oversight over states and localities with a history of voter discrimination. Instead, in a 5-4 decision, the court's conservative justices ruled that the formula used to determine which places require oversight is out of date, CNN explains. (The Washington Post has a quick primer on the law's specifics.) "Our country has changed," John Roberts wrote in his majority opinion, according to NBC. Congress must ensure that any law passed to fight racial discrimination "speaks to current conditions." The ruling puts the onus on Congress to re-draft the formula, and pretty much no one is optimistic about the deeply divided body's ability to do that. On Twitter, Dave Weigel voiced the conventional wisdom thusly: "SCOTUS to Congress: 'You have to pass a bill to fix this.' Congress: 'We can... pass... bills?'"