Voter Suppression in Georgia / Jim Crow 2.0
Introduction
The passage of S.B. 202, signed into law by Republican Georgia Governor Brian Kemp on March 25th, should surprise no one. It is a transparent, shameless and racist attempt to suppress the Black vote in Georgia after a historic election and will surely inspire other states around the country to enact similarly suppressive laws. As noted by CNN, “as of February, state legislators in 43 states have introduced more than 250 bills with restrictive voting provisions.”
The 2020 election highlighted the state’s changing demographics and an energized black electorate. Former Georgia House of Representatives Minority Leader and 2018 Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams (who narrowly lost to Kemp), founded Fair Fight Action to combat voter suppression policies in place in Georgia and throughout the United States. The ground game by Abrams, Fair Fight, and other activists and organizers led to historic voter turnout, with President Joe Biden winning the state and its 16 electoral votes, and the election of two Democratic Senators, Jon Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock. The passage of S.B. 202 is a reaction to that progress — it is being regarded by many as “Jim Crow 2.0.” It is also a bill that may help Governor Kemp in his re-election bid next year (that many feel may be a rematch with Stacey Abrams).
Background
Historically, the primary means for disenfranchisement of formerly enslaved people, post emancipation, were spatialized, racialized, and gendered. From the mid 1700’s to the late 1800’s, the south and subsequently the states that joined the union after the Civil War found ways to restrict the suffrage of anyone who was not a property-owning white male. Before 1761, Georgia maintained a property qualification which they relieved for the more explicit qualification of being a white man, soon after. By the 1840s, that property required was dropped for most white men but still in place for free black men.
When the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868 after the Civil War, it granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States, including former enslaved people, and granted citizens “equal protection of the laws.” With the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870, free black men were granted the right to vote, as the government could no longer deny a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen’s “race, color, or previous condition of servitude”.
As soon as black men obtained the right to vote, racist local governments did their best to prevent them from actually voting. Payment of a poll tax was a prerequisite to the registration for voting in a number of states, coming about in many southern states especially but not only, after the passage of Jim Crow laws. This was in order to restrict black voting after the Fifteenth Amendment was ratified.
Women were finally granted the right to vote with the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920.
The ratification of the Twenty-fourth Amendment in 1964 took a step to dismantle racist Jim Crow era voting laws by prohibiting both Congress and the states from basing the right to vote in federal elections on payment of a poll tax.
In a contemporary context, voting rights in this country have been under attack since the systematic dismantling of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by the US Supreme Court in 2013 (Shelby County v. Holder).
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is federal legislation signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson that prohibited racial discrimination in voting. Congress later amended the Act five times to expand its protections. The removal of barriers such as literacy tests and poll taxes led to an increase in African American voter participation in the United States. Central to the Voting Rights Act was “federal oversight of voter registration in areas where less than 50 percent of the non-white population has not registered to vote”.
The 2013 Supreme Court decision took away the mandate for federal oversight and many states took advantage and enacted suppressive policies, with Georgia leading the charge. Between 2012 and 2018, 214 polling stations were closed in Georgia alone.
What’s in the Bill
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp continued the modern legacy of voter suppression in Georgia by S.B. 202, aka “The Election Integrity Act of 2021”, and putting into place major changes to Georgia’s election laws after the 2020 presidential election.
Creating a voter ID requirement for absentee voting (previously signature matching was sufficient
Severely limiting the use of ballot drop boxes
Giving state lawmakers sweeping control over elections
Shortening the time frame for runoff elections and ends the “jungle primary” system for special elections
Expanding weekend early voting, but cuts short the deadline for requesting absentee ballots
Impacts on Planning & Design
The fight for voting rights and democracy is intrinsically tied into the fields of design and planning of built environments. Severing access to the voting booth for communities of color and politically disenfranchised communities means taking away the right to decide the futures of our communities.
While election rules are different in every state, spatiopolitical barriers define conservitive attempts to maintain power and deny the full enfranchisement of others. On a state level, the tactics of gerrymandering spatially define the boundaries representational power at an urbanism and planning scale. The boundaries we set at the state level determine the boundaries of our cities and neighborhoods impacting the work of planners and architects directly and indirectly.
Prior to the current bill, Georgia spent a decade closing voting precincts in non-white communities. State and local election boards determine the number of precincts across a given state. The limitation or closing of polling places in communities of color serves as a substitute for property restrictions by using density and spatial proximity as a barrier to access. The same can be said for S.B. 202, in that, the limitation of absentee ballots by mail is largely an effort to use the spatial proximity and density of communities as barriers to voting.
Ballot measures can define the types of transportation infrastructure that receives investment. Local municipal elections shape the level and approaches to policing our neighborhoods. The decisions of planning boards translate into built conditions that often last for generations.
It is only through meaningful democractic practices can we hope to achieve just, equitable, and healthy spaces for all communities to thrive. The Design As Protest collective urgently calls for all design practitioners to stay engaged in the calls to preserve and extend basic voting rights.
What can we do?
The bill has passed- what can we do now?
Contact/call your Senator and urge them to pass the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.
Put pressure on corporate businesses based in Georgia including Delta and Coca Cola. Tell them you want to support them but Cannot when they continue to stay silent on voter suppression and Jim Crow 2.0.
Support groups doing the work on the ground, including Fair Fight Action and Black Voters Matter
On behalf of the DAP Collective,
Preeti Sodhi, Bryan C. Lee Jr., and Michelle Lin-Luse
Relevant links:
Five big takeaways on Georgia’s new election law
Georgia Lawmaker Arrested As Governor Signs Law Overhauling Elections