The following guest post was written for Daily Kos by Bryan Fair, interim president and CEO of the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Ten years before passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965, a young Black lawyer returned to his home state of Alabama after graduating law school. His mission, as he often says, was to “tear down segregation everywhere” he found it. He was 23 years old.
His name is not widely known, but it should be. Fred Gray is a civil rights giant. I first came across his story when I moved to Tuscaloosa to work as a law professor at the University of Alabama. My new home was the birthplace of the Civil Rights Movement, and to immerse myself in its history, I read case after case from that era. Mr. Gray had filed nearly every one.
Our democracy today is at a similar inflection point as that faced by civil rights activists in the 1950s and ‘60s. Many of those who have a seat in the halls of power are hell-bent on denying Black, Latino, and Indigenous communities a voice in shaping our future. Like then, this moment requires courageous resistance by multiracial coalitions.
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When I look back at history, what strikes me about Mr. Gray and his contemporaries is how progress has long been driven by determined young people. Mr. Gray’s first client in 1955 was Claudette Colvin, a 15-year-old who refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a Montgomery bus. After Rosa Parks made her own refusal nine months later at age 42, Mr. Gray also took up her case and went on to become the legal mind behind the Montgomery Bus Boycott. He worked alongside the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., who was just 26 at the time.
The persistence of those young organizers — and legions of others fighting for freedom in the Deep South and across the nation — eventually resulted in passage of a series of civil rights laws that changed history. The most transformative was the 1965 Voting Rights Act. In Mississippi, for example, only 6.7 percent of eligible Black people were registered to vote in 1965. Within two years after its passage, that number increased to nearly 60 percent. By 1972, more than 1 million new Black voters were registered across the South, and the gap between white and Black voter registration in the region dropped from an estimated 44 percent to 11 percent.
Despite its efficacy — and its reauthorization five times by broad bipartisan majorities in Congress — the VRA was severely weakened by a 2013 Supreme Court decision, Shelby County v. Holder, and its protections have been further eroded by subsequent attacks. Without the VRA’s shield, states have been able to pass more than 100 anti-voter laws. These changes make it easier to purge voter rolls, shutter polling places, and create onerous ID requirements. Last year, Alabama even enacted a law criminalizing people for helping their friends, family, and neighbors cast a ballot.
Moreover, some elected officials are peddling lies about our election system and trying to override the will of the people with their own extremist agenda. The cumulative result of these tactics is voters feeling powerless, disillusioned, and even fearful of raising their voices. Such strategies are reminiscent of those deployed 60 years ago to silence and subjugate Black people, particularly in the Deep South. But as the young foot soldiers before us knew, what we are fighting for is far more powerful than these moments of defeat. In coalition, we can, and will, move the nation ever closer to a multiracial, inclusive democracy.
It is time for a new Voting Rights Act — one that meets the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century. We need a modern bill that prohibits simple-minded and sophisticated voter suppression devices. It is time for all of us to rally behind the young leaders in our communities and our statehouses who are on the front lines of the fight for a better democracy. I have the great honor of witnessing the tenacity and vision of this new generation of leaders every day. My law students are hungry for justice. They are eager to study the lessons of history and use the law as a tool to ensure everyone has an equal voice and vote in our democracy.
As we commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act this week, we must heed the words of Mr. Gray, who said, “Let’s not assume for one moment that our work is done; the struggle for equal justice continues.” On the shoulders of the giants who risked everything for the right to vote, we march on.