D12. One Person, One Vote? The Ageless Voting Rights Struggle in America

This course will explore voting rights in America from a historical, legal and political perspective. Starting from the original conception of the Founding Fathers, the course will explore the evolution of voting rights through adoption of the 15^th and 19^st Amendments, voting impediments faced by African-Americans during Reconstruction and in the Jim Crow South, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, legal issues posed by the enforcement of the Act, racial and political gerrymandering, and various state restrictions on the right to vote following the Court’s 2013 decision in Shelby County v. Holder (voter I.D. laws, registration procedures, ballot rules, and purges of registration lists). The course will also examine the topics of voter suppression and voter fraud in the context of the 2020 election and the reaction by Republican state legislatures in restricting voting rights, as well as recent Supreme Court decisions impacting voting rights.

INSTRUCTOR: John S. Ross, III (Jack) holds degrees from Yale University and the University of Virginia School of Law and served as Adjunct Professor of Law at Washington and Lee University School of Law. Jack has taught numerous courses in the WISE program on constitutional law and the Supreme Court, and facilitates the WISE Supreme Court SIG.

REQUIRED BOOKS: The Fight to Vote, by Michael Waldman (Simon & Schuster 2016) ISBN 978-1-5011-1648-3