The Yale Law Journal

VOLUME
127
2017-2018
Collection

Five Years After Shelby County v. Holder: The Ongoing Fight for Voting Rights

08 Feb 2018

In the five years since Shelby County v. Holder, voting rights litigators have resorted to other claims under the Voting Rights Act. This Collection traces these litigation strategies—focusing on Sections 2 and 3—and introduces “vote dissociation,” which recognizes systemic problems of democratic governance as a voting rights issue.

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Vote Dissociation

Daniel P. Tokaji

The 2016 election highlighted deep-seated problems in American democracy that voting rights cannot fix. This Essay employs the term “vote dissociation” to refer to a species of voting rights injury that is qualitatively different from both vote denial and vote dilution, in which concentrated wealth …

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A Post-Shelby Strategy: Exposing Discriminatory Intent in Voting Rights Litigation

Danielle Lang & J. Gerald Hebert

In the wake of Shelby County, voting rights lawyers have pushed to hold jurisdictions fully accountable for their actions by proving claims of intentional discrimination under Section 3 of the VRA. This Essay explores the importance of this strategic move in the latest generation of voting rights ca…

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Building an Umbrella in a Rainstorm: The New Vote Denial Litigation Since Shelby County

Dale E. Ho

This Essay traces the post-Shelby County development of a two-part Section 2 vote denial liability test. It also describes the tension as to the necessity of evidence (1) regarding the effect of voting practices on voter turnout and (2) concerning discriminatory intent on the part of a state actor.