By Carol Anderson
Reviewed by Hooshyar Afsar
“It was a mystery worthy of Raymond Chandler. On November 8, 2016, African Americans did not show up.” It is with this provocative statement that Carol Anderson starts the illuminating, factual, diligently researched and engaging book “One Person, No Vote.” Anderson in no way leaves us in the dark and immediately proceeds to elaborate. We learn that a “7 percent overall black voter turnout” drop and the fact that “less than half of Hispanic, and Asian American voters came to the polls” were primarily caused by systematic voter suppression. Yet, this did not happen overnight, and it only makes sense to give the reader a historical perspective.
Anderson provides a unique historical view on the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA) as one of the major accomplishments of the Civil Rights movement. The author writes: “The preventative thrust of VRA was landmark.” The VRA required that the southern states first obtain the Justice Department’s approval on any election law changes. This key provision, called preclearance, transformed the South and thereby expanded democracy across the country. It ended the Southern regime of segregation that had, for all intents and purposes, eliminated African American participation in the election process. Black voter registration in Mississippi went from less than 10 percent in 1964 to almost 60 percent in 1968. “In the region as a whole, roughly a million new voters were registered within a few years … bringing African American registration to a record 62%.” For the first time in the history of the United States, America had come close to having a representative democracy. Yet, similar to the short period of reconstruction after the Civil war, “being in the sun” for African Americans did not last long.
Anderson’s brilliant writing shows us that segregationists of the past did not just throw in the gloves after the VRA. In fact, they immediately started questioning its constitutionality of the VRA through numerous lawsuits and protracted efforts. The author demonstrates that these pernicious efforts were finally successful. In the 2013 landmark case of Shelby County vs. Holder, the Supreme Court ruled to neutralize the VRA by declaring that preclearance is no longer necessary. This decision paved the way for many states, now expanding from the South to other regions of the country, to put in place new methods restricting and reducing African American registration and voting. We learn that what happened in November 2016 was years in the making.
The reader cannot avoid being shocked at the various voter suppression tactics employed. From voter ID requirements while closing DMV offices and reducing their hours, to rampant voter roll purges and extreme gerrymandering (the redrawing of electoral districts for political purposes), the author informs and inspires the reader to act. As a follow-up to her book, in a November 2019 article written for Guardian*, Anderson tells us that voter intimidation of immigrant communities will definitely be a strong weapon of voter suppression in the 2020 elections. She uses the example of Texas secretary of state David Whitley’s claim in January of 2019 that he had evidence of tens of thousands of non-citizens voting as intimidation tactics to expect. She also shows that the claim of non-citizens voting was later debunked when it became clear that there were tens of thousands of naturalized citizens on the list. Anderson goes on to explain that Whitley’s false claim was a signal to the naturalized citizens in immigrant communities to keep their head down and stay away from the poles if they don’t want to be investigated.
Many Americans have a rather simple and naïve view of US history. Certain pronounced facets of this naiveté are that slavery was something really awful but it all ended after it’s abolition by the end of the Civil War… and then there was this “unfortunate thing” called segregation in the South that ended with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Problem solved. For many people, this view provides peace of mind and a good feeling about being American… and then there is Trump and the rise of white nationalism, and many people say that “this is not the America we have known and no matter how disturbing, it is just an aberration and it shall pass” … and then come brilliant authors and historians like Carol Anderson who once again show us with facts and sensible historical analysis that the U S politics in general, and election politics in particular, could neither be understood nor sufficiently analyzed without positioning racism at its core. Racism that also threatens democratic rights of all immigrant communities in the United States.
One Person, No Vote
How Voter Suppression Is Destroying Our Democracy
By Carol Anderson
Bloomsbury. 271 pp. $27
* https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/13/voter-suppression-2020-democracy-america
