Good news if you live in Waller County or believe voting is an important right. Back in February, Prairie View A&M students walked over 7 miles for their right to vote. (video here, pictures here) Now, they are one step closer to reversing decades of illegal, unjust practices in Waller County.
The U.S. Department of Justice reached an agreement yesterday with Waller County, Texas, that is a huge step forward in bringing to an end a concerted effort to suppress the voting rights of Prairie View A&M University students. The Campaign Legal Center serves as legal counsel to a number of students at the historically black university and for the past several months has been coordinating efforts with the Department of Justice officials to take action against Waller County.
In addition to supplying DOJ with information about acts of voting discrimination in Waller County, the Legal Center also provided DOJ with information about voter registration barriers placed in the path of Prairie View A&M students by Waller County Tax Assessor Ellen Shelburne.
On October 9, a complaint was filed in federal court against Waller County alleging that officials there have engaged in unlawful actions against students at Prairie View. In addition to the complaint, a consent judgment was also reached which provides far ranging relief for African-American students at Prairie View.
The settlement requires Waller County officials to stop illegally rejecting voter registration applications for hyper-technical and arbitrary reasons, like the failure to include a zip code, which is not required by state law. The other good news is, application that have been rejected for arbitrary and illegal reasons will now be processed with seven days and applicants will be notified of the disposition of their applications.
"Time and again Waller County officials have raised substantial, unnecessary and, illegal hurdles to Prairie View students exercising their constitutional right to vote," said J. Gerald Hebert, Executive Director of the Campaign Legal Center. "This settlement goes a long way toward correcting this historic abuse of power by local officials to disenfranchise African-Americans."
"Perhaps the most important part of the settlement is that the election officials in Waller County will undergo training and must appear on Prairie View's campus to train deputy voting registrars," said Hebert. "The Waller County election officials, especially Ellen Shelburne, clearly broke the law and they need education.".
Waller County Justice of the Peace DeWayne Charleston, who is African American, has been working to end the racial discrimination in Waller County sees this as a possible first, big step towards making registration and voting opportunities equally available to all Waller County residents. After years of fighting though, he had some shard criticism for Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott for failing to act on complaints from Prairie View A&M students.
"The fact that the Justice Department has sided with Prairie View students in the voting rights battle in Waller County is vindication of what we have been saying for years: Waller County has been engaging in blatant acts of discrimination and it must come to an end," said Charleston. "The fact that the County admitted violating the Voting Rights Act and the 1964 Civil Rights Act shows just how strong our claims of racial discrimination really were. We also will continue to press the County to re-establish a polling place on Prairie View's campus," said Charleston.
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"For the last couple of years, Greg Abbott has promised his office would look into our complaints and take action in Waller County," said Charleston. "He's all talk and no action when it comes to voting rights for minorities. That such blatant acts of racially discriminatory voting practices could occur in Greg Abbott's own back yard is proof positive that he is more focused on protecting the voting rights of Republicans in Texas and his own future prospects for reelection than he is in ending racially discriminatory voting practices at Prairie View."
Perhaps we can focus more state time and resources on protecting people's rights and less time spying on little old ladies in their showers.
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