August 1, 2005
Tribune Washington Bureau
Diana Marrero

WASHINGTON: When President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law 40 years ago, the measure was seen largely as a way to fight discrimination against blacks across the South.

Today, civil rights leaders say the law has evolved to protect the voting rights of growing numbers of minority voters throughout the country, including Indians. As the 40th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act approaches Aug. 6, a much broader coalition is pushing for reauthorization when key provisions of the law expire in 2007.

But while blacks, Hispanics and Asians have been clamoring to gain footing in the American political arena, many Indians remain ambivalent or even distrustful about voting in government elections even as record numbers are now becoming part of the mainstream political process, Indian leaders say.

Still, American Indian leaders say that as tribal members become more engaged in mainstream politics, the Voting Rights Act's importance to their communities will only grow.

"We need to encourage voting to be as accessible as possible to anyone who wants to vote," said Carol Juneau, a state representative who lives on the Blackfeet reservation. Juneau, D-Browning, is one of six Indian state representatives in Montana; two Indians serve in the state Senate. She said the state's 2000 redistricting efforts have helped increase Indian representation at the state and local levels.

Indians join in

The National Congress of American Indians has joined dozens of civil rights leaders in Washington, D.C., to launch a national campaign for the reauthorization of provisions in the voting rights law that will expire in two years.

One of the provisions requires that certain states and precincts mostly in the South have their voting laws and redistricting plans "pre-cleared" by the Justice Department.

Other provisions require local elections officials to provide bilingual ballots and elections material to voters who live in heavily non-English speaking areas and grant the federal government the power to assign elections examiners to districts on Election Day. Congressional hearings on the issue may start as early as this fall.

But as the reauthorization of the bill gains support among members of Congress, Indian leaders will have to persuade tribal members to join the fight.

"You have to convince people that it's OK to vote for a government they don't believe in, that sent their grandmas to boarding school and took away their lands," said Heather Dawn Thompson, a member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe in South Dakota who is working on voting rights issues for the National Congress of American Indians. "But we are being more realistic in our communities, realizing that whether or not we vote, decisions are still going to be made that affect us. We might as well have our voices heard."

Johnson pushed act

President Johnson rallied for the speedy passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965 after police brutality on non-violent civil rights marchers in Selma, Ala., shocked the nation and brought the issue to the forefront.

Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., who is all for the renewal of the law, was among the civil rights marchers badly beaten in Selma. He says that while the Voting Rights Act has dramatically changed the country's political landscape in the past 40 years, more needs to be done to ensure fairness for America's increasingly diverse electorate.

Although the law got rid of the literacy tests, poll taxes and overt intimidation that kept many blacks from the polls throughout the South, voter suppression and intimidation of minority voters still played a key role in the 2000 and 2004 elections, Lewis said.

In Montana, the Voting Rights Act makes specific requirements of two counties Big Horn (county seat Hardin) and Rosebud (county seat Forsyth). The law requires the counties to provide language assistance for tribal members who speak Cheyenne. The law also has been used by the American Civil Liberties Union to challenge redistricting plans in the state, although the plans do not have to be "pre-cleared" by the federal government.

Political payoff

Efforts in recent years to increase voter turnout among American Indians has paid political dividends across the country, Thompson said. She said the American Indian voting bloc was influential in the re-elections of Sen. Tim Johnson, D-S.D., and Rep. Grace Napolitano, D-Calif., as well as the election of Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash.

Even so, Indians continue to vote at much higher rates in tribal elections. About 80 percent vote in tribal elections, while only about 20 percent cast state or national ballots, she said.

Some tribes in Montana are trying to increase turnout for non-tribal elections by moving their tribal elections to coincide with federal elections, said Gail Small, director of Native Action in Montana, a non-profit group working on improving voter education on the reservations.

Small, who lives in Rosebud, said that although she supports the Voting Rights Act, she wishes it were more strongly enforced. She said she has never seen any bilingual ballots in her own county and has always had to help her mother read the ballots during elections.

Her mother, who is 78, can speak English but needs help understanding complex ballot issues because her native language is Cheyenne.

"Every reservation has a language barrier issue when it comes to voting that needs to be addressed," Small said.