15th Amendment Archives | American Democracy Minute

Arkansas Congressional District Racial Gerrymandering Case Dismissed by Federal Court Panel

June 8, 2025June 8, 2025

A three-judge panel dismissed a case June 6th by a group of Black Arkansas voters that the state legislature racially gerrymandered Arkansas’ 2nd Congressional District. It’s the state’s fourth redistricting challenge since 2021.

The Voting Rights Act of 1965, Born Out of ‘Bloody Sunday,’ Fights for Its Life in the Face of an Activist U.S. Supreme Court Majority

March 10, 2025March 10, 2025

Five months after peaceful voting rights marchers were viciously attacked by their own government in Selma, Alabama, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed by President Lyndon Johnson. Anti-voter legislatures are now challenging the VRA’s protections, even though that discrimination continues.

Would the Founding Fathers Have Given You the Freedom to Vote?

July 3, 2023July 3, 2023

Thomas Jefferson was an owner of enslaved people when he wrote this line in the Declaration of Independence: "Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed." Who could give that Consent by voting was debated by the landed White male gentry, framing what became the U.S. Constitution in 1787.

ADM for Oct. 7, 2022: Supreme Court Majority’s Questions Suggest it Will Uphold Alabama’s Redistricting Map Diluting the Black Vote

October 6, 2022October 6, 2022

During our exploration of the Moore v. Harper case this week, a challenge to Alabama’s Congressional redistricting plan was heard in the U.S. Supreme Court. In Merrill v. Milligan, voting rights groups challenged the legislature’s Congressional maps, saying it diluted the votes of Black voters.