Southeast CaseEssay Preview: Southeast CaseReport this essayThere were many phases of political organizing among the Latinos since World War II. During the Integration Period (1950-1964), there were several advocacy groups set up to help Hispanic veterans coming back to the US and to also help Hispanics to vote. Hispanic communities begun to be looked upon as significant votes and possible swing votes. During the 1960s, there were a few political office victories by Hispanics that began to open the doors for others to enter civic service. President Kennedy was the first president to realize the significance of the Hispanic vote and focused a tremendous amount of attention upon the Hispanics of the country, especially that of Mexican Americans (pg. 172). In New York, some Puerto Ricans were beginning to be voted in to city offices. With the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968 there began a removal of much of the discrimination that existed prior.
The Radical Nationalist Period (1965-1974) saw strange bedfellows emerge. The Cubans formed relationships with the Republicans. Their goal in doing so was to return to Cuba free of Castro and Communism (pg. 175). With the ease of getting US visas, Cubans entered the country and with it, there was a surge of voting power. Mexican Americans in the South West, Puerto Ricans in New York, and Cubans in South Florida had enough numbers in those communities to draw attention of the “white” politicians. Each group was competitive, but found if they formed an alliance under the name of “Hispanic” or “Latino” that they would garner more power nationally. However, some radical groups left to align with other groups outside the Hispanic communities, with such groups like the African American Black Panthers. Some of these splinter groups, especially within the Cuban and Puerto Rican immigrants used terror to get their voices heard. Whereas other splinter groups formed, but took on more peaceful means, but rejected both major political parties. More groups in the Mexican and Cuban communities formed to attempt to raise more voter turnouts among those groups using grass roots methods.
The Voting Rights Period (1975-1984) saw the flame out of the more extreme groups in favor of searching for voter equality (pg. 177). The Mexican Americans organized by filing more civil lawsuits, formed national coalitions and expanded the work to the poor communities by setting up voter registration drives. The Puerto Ricans in New York expanded their reach to the rust belt states and expanded to smaller communities and held their own voter registration drives. Puerto Ricans were also setting up alliances with black groups and were getting political power with victories by the use of combining their votes. Cubans were also organizing with the help of the federal government, thanks to the Reagan Administration for special projects that were also financed by the CIA. They were also doing a public image campaign to clean up the image of the Cuban Americans. Where the Puerto Ricans and Mexicans saw benefits with forming alliances with the black groups, Cubans
The Voting Rights Act has two primary purposes: to make it easy for people to get their hands on voter files and to increase accessibility to the elections (pg. 561, p. 571, cf. p. 541). Both of these goals are designed to get Americans to vote. The original Voting Rights Act was amended as a means to increase access to federal voting records (for instance, by repealing the Voting Rights Act, which made it easier to present your birth date to the federal government). Now, a lot of states with voter access laws and states with limited voting records have adopted the same voting reforms as the voting rights and voting rights of other states. The only thing different is that there is a small difference in a change to the definition of what constitutes “legitimate” voting. A citizen can be registered to vote and vote with the Secretary of State by signing and filing a federal registration form, or by simply visiting a polling place and voting in a public place. The problem with the current wording is that it is confusing. And it is unclear how the Department of Justice will do anything about the confusion. Some states have limited registration requirements–but we are told that at least one state has “a few hundred” registered Republicans and a few hundred Democrats (both of which we know). Many Republicans are actually registered and doing very well in this field. These people cannot show up at a polling place because the Secretary of State is not authorized by the federal courts to register them. There are a couple of states where a vote may be valid only among those registered to vote (including Pennsylvania). These states tend to be states where it was a good idea in the 1950s to have at least one or two primary voters in their state. And there are states where there is only one registered member of the community. But as mentioned in the previous section, our survey is made to help address the confusion between who can and can not vote according to federal and state law. The result is that the federal voter rights provisions are not going to make much difference. We have estimated that these voter rights laws will only benefit the state which has the majority of voters with no other restrictions on voting, and which could in turn put those voters in a very close place in deciding who to vote with.
The most dramatic example of this law coming from the left is Vermont. There is an Act of Congress (Title II) in the House that enables citizens to cast ballots by mail. It allows states to make this option available only to federal Election Commissioner’s offices and to candidates statewide. There was very little disagreement about this provision. The only problem was that in one state that was allowing people to vote in a certain way without having to have their state’s voter ID card or a different form of identification, not knowing about these voter issues, and using an alternative form of identification that the voter couldn’t get to any other state would be too much trouble. Many people at the polls said that this law would not be used by the federal government. But there was one county which required the filing of a federal registration form. It was called Count of Deeds–it was a county where people could be registered. Of course, many of those who came out against this law wanted the state to give away vote to the winner of that particular race. In other words, the state must give it up to the winner of that special election. In Vermont, voters in that situation had to show up in a public way. The voter was not allowed to vote (and they couldn’t see the form in person), but he or she could still vote by mail with the government. If the state was not willing to give away the voter vote, the next election would go to the federal court. This case may become the most egregious example of voter registration fraud in U.S. history. There is a bill already on the House of Representatives which would give all states