Guy-Uriel Charles Delivers 2018 Barrett Lecture on Constitutional Law

Guy-Uriel Charles, Professor of Law and Senior Associate Dean for Faculty and Research at Duke University School of Law, delivered the 2018 Edward L. Barrett, Jr., Lecture on Constitutional Law on February 6. Speaking to a capacity audience in the Kalmanovitz Appellate Courtroom that included numerous King Hall faculty members, Charles spoke on "Race, Exit and the Voting Rights Act."

Professor Charles’s lecture addressed the past and future of the Voting Rights Act (VRA), which he called “a distinctive and successful approach to addressing racial equality in voting, an approach constructed from the iron fillings of the Civil Rights movement.” Prospects for the continued effectiveness of the VRA have been called into doubt by the Supreme Court decision in Shelby County v. Holder. The ruling struck down two key provisions of the Act and greatly diminished the ability of the Justice Department to prevent states and local governments from implementing new voting laws and procedures that could work to disenfranchise minority voters, Charles noted.

Charles said that the Supreme Court’s ruling was based in part on the fact that the VRA allowed for temporary, unequal treatment of certain jurisdictions on the basis of discrimination that had occurred in the past. Attempting to reinstate protections on a similar basis would likely prove ineffective, he said.

“We must reject the temptation to frame civil rights or voting rights law in the context of the past,” said Charles. “That path is perilous and perhaps unnecessary. Voting rights policy going forward ought to build a new consensus to replace the old. The new consensus ought to look forward toward a fundamental right to political participation that ought to be etched into the constitutional structure, that should not be viewed as being in opposition to it, that should not be viewed as inconsistent with our fundamental commitments, that ought not to be temporary. The attempt to recreate the past is not an option for those who wish to live in the future.”