Resolved: The Supreme Court rightly decided that Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act violated the Con

Lets start with answering the questions the opposition has presented. 1. How has gerrymandering happened since June 2013 if the census, and redistricting occurs at the start of the century? They can do out-of-cycle redistricting. 2. If the PRO can prove that the new voter ID laws are not discriminatory, do I win this debate? Why or Why not? No because in the card itself it says it is discriminatory. You can bring up cards saying voter ID laws are not discriminatory, but it doesn't matter as I have shown that voter ID laws can and are discriminatory in these cases. 3. How has section 4 passed strict scrutiny? Like I have stated in my own case, there is southern racism, so this is one of the reasons why it passes strict scrutiny. Now on to the opposition's case. In their observation about scrutiny, I do not having to have the burden of proving this, because the resolution says its self if it was ruled constitutional or not. It doesn't not say if it is good or not. Even so, I have proven it is good from my C1. Since the opposition did not refute my definitions, nor has a standard. We shall be using my definitions and standard in todays round. Contention 1: Section 4 is obsolete. Subpoint A: It is no longer necessary to take away the sovereignty of the states in order to stop voter discrimination. I have 5 responses for this. 1. Equal protection of voting rights is more important " it"s explicit and clear in the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution. 2. We should be more concerned with the rights of individuals than the rights of state governments. 3. Additionally, the equal sovereignty doctrine only applies when states are entering the Union. i. This is Justice Ginsburg, citing the Katzenbach case: By: Ruth Ginsburg, Supreme Court Justice June 25, 2013 http://www.supremecourt.gov... The Court stops any application of [Section 5] "5 by holding that [Section 4"s] "4(b)"s coverage formula is unconstitutional. It pins this result, in large measure, to "the fundamental principle of equal sovereignty." Ante, at 10"11, 23. In Katzenbach, however, the Court held, in no uncertain terms, that the principle "applies only to the terms upon which States are admitted to the Union, and not to the remedies for local evils which have subsequently appeared." 383 U. S., at 328"329 (emphasis added). Impact: As evidence clearly states, treating states equally only applies to when they first join the Union. Therefore, it is not unconstitutional to treat the Southern states differently because they have been in the Union for a while. 4. The federal government can never treat states "equally" " they all have different needs and different conditions. The affirmative must clarify what "equal sovereignty" means. 5. When some states violate people"s rights, the federal government must step in to correct those states. That is much more important. Subpoint B: The court ruling protects section 5 and allows section 4 to be renewed. I have 2 responses to this. 1. The spirit of the law is more important than the letter of the law. The Voting Rights Act exists to prevent racist voting procedures. Those unquestionably still occur. 2. A flawed law is better than no law, which is what the Court has left us with " the states are now free to do all sorts of racist actions. Sections 2 and 3 do not stop this effectively. Also in that contention it talks about a redraft but, that will not happen. 1. That argument doesn"t mean that Section 4 is unconstitutional, which is what the affirmative must prove. 2. The US House of Representatives is controlled by white Southern Republicans. They"re not going to pass laws that increase the number of black people who vote in their districts. At best they will pass a weak version and try to make people think that voting rights are still being enforced. 3. The Senate is controlled by Democrats. They"ll never pass anything that the Republican House would like. Response 2 and 3 in general are saying gridlock. Contention 2: The VRA violated the 10th amendment, and the PRECLEARANCE REQUIREMENT. The 15th amendment trumps the 10th amendment. The Huffington Post reported on July 1, 2013 that: By: The Huffington Post July 1, 2013 http://www.huffingtonpost.com... The 15th Amendment Trumps the 10th Amendment on Voting Rights But, equal sovereignty is the Chief Justice's invention. It is not in the Constitution and, if anything, the structure of the Constitution and the make-up of the government it created show that there was no intention to accord states equal sovereignty. So we can take down this contention as we can see the 15th amendment strikes down the 10th amendment which is their only argument against how its unconstitutional. Now back to my case. He claims that my framework is my C1, but my framework is my definitions and my standard. Now on to my C1. He says that voter ID laws have been passed in other states and that is true. But, there is a difference on why those IDs are not discriminatory and these are. Free Voter IDs Jason Mycoff of the University of Delaware, stated that: By: Jason D. Mycoff, University of Delaware; Michael W. Wagner, University of Nebraska; David C. Wilson, University of Delaware January 2009 http://www.brennancenter.org... First, Public Law 109-2005 requires that the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) issue any voting eligible citizens a free voter-ID card, which is valid for six years, upon request. Aside from monetary costs, time costs- in Indiana at at least- also appear to be relatively low. The BMV estimates that the average visit time to one of the 146 statewide BMV offices is eight minutes, with the longest average visit time in the state at 14 minutes. Between January 1, 2007 and May 6, 2008 the BMV issued 257,100 free identification cards. Impact: Minorities don"t need to pay to get a voter ID; the BMV gives everyone a free ID within 14 minutes as long as they are citizens. They also have many locations, proving that it isn"t inconvenient for minority voters. We can see Indiana, a state not in the VRA, is helping minorities. The states under the VRA are not helping minorities because like my evidence has stated, the laws they put in the states in the VRA are discriminatory. C2: They tell me that voter rates have went up, but I have 2 responses to this. 1) If you look it says CNN Opinion and if that doesn't sound unreliable, we can look at the persons credentials and it says the author is Bryan Preston, who was communications director of the Republican Party of Texas. We can see the bias of this article. It's from a Republican who just so happened to agree with the law that REPUBLICANS made. So we can drop the oppositions who refutation about how rates have gone up because of voter ID laws. C3: The opposition comes up and says that gerrymandering isn't in section 4, and yes it isn't. RACIAL gerrymandering is. My contention says and I quote: Discriminatory gerrymandering, also called redistricting, will occur and violate rights. Also, in crossfire, the opposition asked me how is this possible, and I answered there is out-of-cycle redistricting, which Texas has done before. C4 :I have refuted every rebuttal the opposition has made and I have refuted their case so we can see that it is protecting voting rights. Questions for the opposition. Is preclearance a punishment. Why/why not? Where is equal sovereignty in the constitution? For these reasons, I strongly urge a negative ballot.