Racial Justice Advocacy Group
Heather Cox Richardson, August 5, 2025
Sixty years ago tomorrow, on August 6, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act. The need for the law was explained in its full title: “An Act to enforce the fifteenth amendment to the Constitution, and for other purposes.”
In the wake of the Civil War, Americans tried to create a new nation in which the law treated Black men and white men as equals. In 1865 they ratified the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, outlawing enslavement except as punishment for crimes. In 1868 they adjusted the Constitution again, guaranteeing that anyone born or naturalized in the United States—except certain Indigenous Americans—was a citizen, opening up suffrage to Black men. In 1870, after Georgia legislators expelled their newly seated Black colleagues, Americans defended the right of Black men to vote by adding that right to the Constitution.
All three of those amendments—the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth—gave Congress the power to enforce them. In 1870, Congress established the Department of Justice to do just that. Reactionary white southerners had been using state laws, and the unwillingness of state judges and juries to protect Black Americans from white gangs and cheating employers, to keep Black people subservient. White men organized as the Ku Klux Klan to terrorize Black men and to keep them and their white allies from voting to change that system. In 1870 the federal government stepped in to protect Black rights and prosecute members of the Ku Klux Klan.
With federal power now behind the Constitutional protection of equality, threatening jail for those who violated the law, white opponents of Black voting changed their argument against it.
In 1871 they began to say that they had no problem with Black men voting on racial grounds; their objection to Black voting was that Black men, just out of enslavement, were poor and uneducated. They were voting for lawmakers who promised them public services like roads and schools, and which could only be paid for with tax levies.
The idea that Black voters were socialists—they actually used that term in 1871—meant that white northerners who had fought to replace the hierarchical society of the Old South with a society based on equality began to change their tune. They looked the other way as white men kept Black men from voting, first with terrorism and then with grandfather clauses that cut out Black men without mentioning race by permitting a man to vote if his grandfather had, literacy tests in which white registrars got to decide who passed, poll taxes, and so on. States also cut up districts unevenly to favor the Democrats, who ran an all-white, segregationist party. By 1880 the South was solidly Democratic, and it would remain so until 1964.
Southern states always held elections: it was just foreordained that Democrats would win them.
Black Americans never accepted this state of affairs, but their opposition did not gain powerful national traction until after World War II.
During that war, Americans from all walks of life had turned out to defeat fascism, a government system based on the idea that some people are better than others. Americans defended democracy and, for all that Black Americans fought in segregated units, and that race riots broke out in cities across the country during the war years, and that the government interned Japanese Americans, lawmakers began to recognize that the nation could not effectively define itself as a democracy if Black and Brown people lived in substandard housing, received substandard educations, could not advance from menial jobs, and could not vote to change any of those circumstances.
Meanwhile, Black Americans and people of color who had fought for the nation overseas brought home their determination to be treated equally, especially as the financial collapse of European nations loosened their grip on their former African and Asian colonies and launched new nations.
Those interested in advancing Black rights turned, once again, to the federal government to overrule discriminatory state laws. Spurred by lawyers Thurgood Marshall and Constance Baker Motley, judges used the due process clause and the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to argue that the protections in the Bill of Rights applied to the states, that is, the states could not deprive any American of equality. In 1954 the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren, the Republican former governor of California, used this doctrine when it handed down the Brown v. Board of Education decision declaring segregated schools unconstitutional.
White reactionaries responded with violence, but Black Americans continued to stand up for their rights. In 1957 and 1960, under pressure from Republican president Dwight Eisenhower, Congress passed civil rights acts designed to empower the federal government to enforce the laws protecting Black voting.
In 1961 the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO) began intensive efforts to register voters and to organize communities to support political change. Because only 6.7% of Black Mississippians were registered, Mississippi became a focal point, and in the “Freedom Summer” of 1964, organized under Bob Moses, volunteers set out to register voters. On June 21, Ku Klux Klan members, at least one of whom was a law enforcement officer, murdered organizers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner near Philadelphia, Mississippi, and, when discovered, laughed at the idea they would be punished for the murders.
That year, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which strengthened voting rights. When Black Americans still couldn’t register to vote, on March 7, 1965, in Selma, Alabama, marchers set out for Montgomery to demonstrate that they were being kept from registering. Law enforcement officers on horseback met them with clubs on the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The officers beat the marchers, fracturing the skull of young John Lewis (who would go on to serve 17 terms in Congress).
On March 15, President Johnson called for Congress to pass legislation defending Americans’ right to vote. It did. And on this day in 1965, the Voting Rights Act became law. It became such a fundamental part of our legal system that Congress repeatedly reauthorized it, by large margins, as recently as 2006.
But in the 2013 Shelby County v. Holder decision, the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts struck down the provision of the law requiring that states with histories of voter discrimination get approval from the Department of Justice before they changed their voting laws. Immediately, the legislatures of those states, now dominated by Republicans, began to pass measures to suppress the vote. In the wake of the 2020 election, Republican-dominated states increased the rate of voter suppression, and on July 1, 2021, the Supreme Court permitted such suppression with the Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee decision.
Currently, the Supreme Court is considering whether a Louisiana district map that took race into consideration to draw a district that would protect Black representation is unconstitutional. About a third of Louisiana’s residents are Black, but in 2022 its legislature carved the state up in such a way that only one of its six voting districts was majority Black. A federal court determined that the map violated the Voting Rights Act, so the legislature redrew the map to give the state two majority-Black districts.
A group of “non-African American voters” immediately challenged the law, saying the new maps violated the Fourteenth Amendment because the mapmakers prioritized race when drawing them. A divided federal court agreed with their argument. Now the Supreme Court will weigh in.
Meanwhile, on July 29, Senator Raphael Warnock (D-GA) led a number of his Democratic colleagues in reintroducing a measure to restore and expand the Voting Rights Act. The bill is called the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act after the man whose skull police officers fractured on the Edmund Pettus Bridge.
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Notes:
https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/constance-baker-motley.htm
https://www.oyez.org/cases/2025/24-109
https://www.naacpldf.org/case-issue/louisiana-v-callais-faq/
[Here is a PDF version of this piece. – ed.]
SPOTLIGHT ON HAITI!
The Racial Justice Advocacy Group calls attention to the current plight of Haitians. According to the 2025 World Population Review, Massachusetts has the second highest Haitian population in the United States with about 77,000 Haitians in the Boston area. They may be your friends, neighbors, classmates, teachers, nurses, nursing assistants, personal, nursing home, or rehabilitation caregivers, hospital workers, transportation workers, food service workers, and more! Their futures in Massachusetts are now in danger and they are at risk of facing deportation from the U.S.
Many Haitians currently have a legal classification called “Temporary Protected Status” (“TPS”). “TPS” was created by Congress in the Immigration Act of 1990. It is a temporary humanitarian immigration status granted by the U.S. government to nationals of specifically designated countries that are experiencing severe crises—such as war, natural disasters, or political unrest—that make it unsafe for their return. For Haitians, TPS has been both a legal lifeline and a source of constant uncertainty.
Some Haitians have lived here for decades, while many arrived in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake in January, 2010 that killed an estimated 300,000 people and displaced more than a million others. With the grant of TPS, qualifying Haitian nationals already in the United States (at initial designation) were allowed to continue to live and work legally in the U.S. without fear of deportation. Haiti has been redesignated and TPS has been extended several times since 2010 due to the country’s ongoing instability—triggered by political violence, natural disasters, economic collapse, and widespread gang control, particularly in Port-au-Prince. With these extensions, some additional arrivals could qualify for TPS. In the most recent 18 month extension, Haitians were granted TPS through February 3, 2026.
The Secretary of Homeland Security has discretion to decide when a country merits a TPS designation. Other agencies such as the Department of State, the National Security Council, and occasionally the Department of Justice, are often consulted by the DHS Secretary regarding such designations.
On June 17, 2025, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem announced the termination of Temporary Protected Status for Haiti. Now the TPS designation for Haiti expires on Aug. 3, 2025. The termination will be effective on Tuesday, September 2, 2025.
The DHS announcement stated that “After conferring with interagency partners, Secretary Noem determined that conditions in Haiti no longer meet the TPS statutory requirements. The Secretary’s decision was based on a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services review of the conditions in Haiti and in consultation with the Department of State. The Secretary determined that, overall, country conditions have improved to the point where Haitians can return home in safety. She further determined that permitting Haitian nationals to remain temporarily in the United States is contrary to the national interest of the United States.”
On July 1, 2025, a Federal District Judge for the Eastern District of New York granted postponement of DHS’ action to end Haitian TPS early in Haitian Evangelical Clergy Association et al. v Trump et al. The court found that DHS had overstepped its legal authority by attempting to cut short the designation without following federal procedures. At least for now, under this decision TPS for Haiti should be restored to the February 3, 2026 end date. USCIS has not updated their Haiti TPS webpage as of this writing (7/14/2025).
If you are concerned about this, please reach out to your senator and Congressional representative in Washington. Calls (letters and e-mails) expressing your views count for a lot!
NOTE: Although this comment focuses on TPS for Haitians, of the seventeen countries designated for TPS as of June, 2025, five others have also been terminated, including Afghanistan, Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.
For more information see:
• www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org › fact-sheet › temporary-protected-status-overview
• immigrationforum.org/article/temporary-protected-status-fact-sheet/
• www.uscis.gov>temporary-protected-status
• Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti – www.ijdh.org
• npr.org/2025/07/07/g-s1-76373/trump-immigration-tps-nicaragua-honduras
• nytimes.com/2025/07/07/us/politics/trump-deportations-tps-honduras-nicaragua.html
Out of the Just Faith Community series, starting in November 2020, the Racial Justice Advocacy Group was formed. We are planning a range of educational and community action(s). We are looking for people who are concerned about the many facets of racism and seek concrete ways to deconstruct racist systems. We welcome new members who can meet once a month and support the Ministry’s work.
You can see our Mission Statement below. are interested in hearing more, please contact either Tom Sharkey (sharkey.te@verizon.net) or Susan Buta (sue@buta.org)
Contact Susan Buta for information about upcoming meetings on zoom. RJAG meetings take place the second Tuesday of the month at 7 PM via zoom.
Mission Statement
The Paulist Center’s Racial Justice Advocacy Group, holds racial justice as the systematic fair treatment of people of all races that results in equitable opportunities and outcomes for everyone.
Racial justice—or racial equity—goes beyond “anti-racism.” It is not just the absence of discrimination and inequities, but also the presence of deliberate systems and supports to achieve and sustain racial equity.
The Racial Justice Advocacy Group seeks to promote racial justice by supporting Paulist Center members in:
- Understanding the history of racism and the system of white supremacy (education).
- Engaging in personal and collective introspection to reimagine and co-create within the Paulist Center Community deliberate systems and supports that achieve and sustain racial equity.
- Envisioning and identifying opportunities in our local community and beyond to help progress on the ground level, through existing Paulist Center ministries or external initiatives.
- Joining with other faith communities in order to walk alongside people on the margins; and
- Exerting power and influence – grounded in love and relationships – at the town, state and national levels, to disrupt and resist the status quo and to hold our elected leaders accountable for enacting policies and laws that promote racial and social justice.