Topic: Voting Rights
Senator: Hatch
Date: SEPTEMBER 14, 2005
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HATCH: Now let me just ask you a question that relates to some of the answers you gave yesterday regarding the voting rights.
Even as the hearing was unfolding, again, Democratic staffers of the committee issued a press release that said that you had missed an opportunity to distance yourself from what the release called your "earlier narrow positions on the reach of the Voting Rights Act."
Now, that is not what I heard you say nor do I believe that is what the public heard. The Democratic press release said that you had "resorted to vague generalities about the importance of voting."
Now, as I heard you, I heard you explain the vigorous debate that took place regarding reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act in the 1980s.
And, by the way, I was part of that debate. I felt very deeply that the effects test should apply to Section 5, to those states that had a history of discrimination.
HATCH: But I also felt very deeply at the time that the intent test should apply to all the other states in Section 2. Which was the position, I think, the administration took that you had to do some research on within the administration.
Now, I lost in committee. Now, I was arguing that all of the states that did not have a history of discrimination should not be burdened by the effects test, which basically says, "If the effects of what happens looks like discrimination, that therefore is, even if there was never an intent to commit discrimination."
Now, I lost. But I feel that the Voting Rights Act is the most important civil rights bill in history, and I felt it then. And I voted for the amended bill with the effects test language in Section 2 and have been a strong supporter ever since.
Would that be fair to describe your feelings about that?
ROBERTS: Well, yes, Senator.
The debate, as you remember, was over whether or not Section 2 should be extended without change, as interpreted by the Supreme Court in Mobile against Bolden, or whether it should be changed to incorporate the effects test and later the totality of the circumstances test.
The administration position at the time was to extend the Voting Rights Act for the longest period in history without change, and that was the position that I was working on at the time.
And Congress eventually decided -- Senator Dole and some other senators, developed a compromise position on Section 2, and that was enacted with the support of the administration.
And the one thing that was clear to me throughout those extended debates was that the people on both sides of the issue in good faith supported extension of the Voting Rights Act and recognized the importance of the Voting Rights Act in securing civil liberties for all Americans.
ROBERTS: It wasn't a dispute about the goal. It wasn't a dispute about the objective. It wasn't a dispute about the importance. It was a dispute about whether to extend the act without change or whether to make changes in the act. And that was what the debate was about.
HATCH: Well, and the difference was that the administration vehemently wanted to pass the Voting Rights Act as it existed that was somewhat difficult to pass originally when it was originally passed. And that was a decent, honorable position.
But when it was changed, through our democratic process up here on Capitol Hill, I felt for the worse at the time, but I feel like I was wrong at the time. Then we voted for it.
In fact, it was my friend Senator Kennedy who insisted that I come down to the White House as part of the bill-signing team, because he knew how deeply I felt about this.
But there was a legitimate reason to take the administration's position. And once the compromise was reached with Senators Dole and Kennedy, the administration accepted that as well and so did you.
And that's the point I just, kind of, wanted to make because I think it's important to realize that we can sometimes get to a point where we misconstrue the intentions of decent, honorable people. And I count myself one of those.
And even though I lost in committee -- I voted for this bill because to me it is the most important civil rights bill in history, albeit others are very important as well.
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