Clarence Thomas casts lone vote against Voting Rights Act

In an 8-1 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Justice Clarence Thomas cast the lone vote against a key provision of the Voting Rights Act on Monday.

The Court, in Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District Number One v. Holder (PDF link) declined to overturn the 1965 Voting Rights Act that has often been challenged by conservative critics as unnecessary. Instead it avoided the "difficult" question about the constitutionality of the law. But the Court did allow a tiny Texas municipality to be exempted from a requirement to provide advance notice before making changes to its election procedures.

In his dissent, Thomas seemed to argue that the Voting Rights Act is no longer necessary because the explicit racial segregation of the Jim Crow era is gone.

''The violence, intimidation and subterfuge that led Congress to pass Section 5 and this court to uphold it no longer remains,'' Thomas wrote. He admitted that in 1965, "Congress had every reason to conclude that States with a history of disenfranchising voters based on race would continue to do all they could to evade the constitutional ban on voting discrimination." But, Thomas added, "The extensive pattern of discrimination that led the Court to previously uphold Section 5 . . . no longer exists...And the days of 'grandfather clauses, property qualifications, 'good character' tests, and the requirement that registrants 'understand' or 'interpret' certain matter,' are gone."

The remaining eight members of the court avoided the constitutional issue. "Whether conditions continue to justify such legislation is a difficult constitutional question we do not answer today," Chief Justice Roberts wrote for the Court.