Has oats that can help lower cholesterol . And it tastes good . Sure does wow. [ buzz ] delicious, right . Yeah. Its the honey, it makes it taste so. Well, would you look at the time. Whats the rush . Bee happy. Bee healthy. With clusters of flakes and os. Oh, ho ho. Its the honey sweetness. I. I mean, you. Love. This morning, my question. Are more guns the answer to gun violence . Plus, julian bond joins me to talk keystone. Plus, i have a panel of constitutional law experts. We are about to talk nerdland style. Good morning, im Melissa Harrisperry. They dont call the Supreme Court the highest court in the land for nothing. Its the final say over disputes over law in the constitution. With cases on samesex marriage and Voting Rights coming before the court, this could prove to be a landmark year. Lets start with the big gi. On wednesday, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in shelby county, alabama versus holder. Just in case you were wondering, yes, its attorney general, eric older the named defendant in the case. They are asking the court to review the 2006 decision to reauthorize section five of the Voting Rights under the 14th and 15th amendments and violated the tenth amendment and article four of the constitution. It may sound like legal mumbo jumbo. Nine of the states covered as a whole and most of those in the south to get federal approval before a new election law is imposed. They challenge whether such a provision is necessary. The plaintiffs in the case dont think they need it anymore. Oh, really . Shelby county, let me remind you why you are one of the state that is were included under section five. You think you have come a long way since 1965, images like this one are forever engrained in the minds of men and women who endured police attacks, racism and death for the right to vote. When president johnson signed the law in 1965, americans of color get that right and states, like yours, could not use tactics to undermine it. He explained the importance of section five best on in the speech saying the heart of the act is plain. Wherever by clear and objective standards, states and counties are using regulations or laws or tests to deny the right to vote, then they will be struck down. It is clear state officials intend to discriminate. The federal examiners will be sent in to register all voters. When the process of elimination is gone, the examiners will be withdrawn. For the first time millions of africanamericans could vote without undue influence or violence. Lets be honest about a few things. First, 1965 was not that long ago. Even if the images are in black and white, its around the corner historically. And the redistricting plan was as recent as 2006. The process that will unravel or sustain a key act begins. The way the Supreme Court decides is vitally important and could leave many americans, particularly americans of color with less right to vote. Theres a lot to unpack in this issue and i am not a lawyer. We went out and got a table full of them to help me out. Joining me is sheryl lynn eiffel, president and director of the naacp legal fund. Ken is a nerdland favorite, the chief justice professor of constitutional law at nyu law school. He didnt just spring forth from a rock. Here is his adviser, professor of law at Yale University and nick. Theres not one way to read the law. Here we all are. Thank you so much. I have been trying to convince my producers. It made sense to have an insider discussion that allows us to have a broad conversation about what we are facing in this court. Lets start with section five. Akeel, second five is about the power of congress to do something visavis the state. Is that what this is about . Exactly. The objection is, in part, you are singling out states to jump through federal hoops. The irony is the very process by what the 14th amendment the constitution was because they had rights rk Voting Rights and other rights, democratic rights in the process the 14thnd 15th amendments. Certain states were required to jump through special hoops. The same states covered by section five of the voting act that echoes poetically the process by which the 14th and 15th amendments became part of the constitution. I have a little piece. Its harvard law review online. Its the lawfulness of section five of the 14th amend. I have it in front of me. I read it last night and this morning which is why theres coffee on it. The piece the sentence i wanted to pull from it, i wanted to ask you about anymore. This general announcement supports broad congressional power to administer strong and selective medicine to individual states with sorry democratic with a little d employed by section five. We have pres denlt for this decision. On the other side, folks are saying nope, you cant single out states and counties. Lets not forget theres second two of the voting act right as well. It prohibits Racial Discrimination in the voting context. Section five is and always has be be beena remedy. Frankly, as bad as things may be in certain areas, we are nowhere near the discrimination of the jim crow era. Certainly, its an extraordinary remedy today. Its an interesting point. It feels to me like saying, my Blood Pressure medicine is working so well, im going stop taking it. Its clearly section five because it doesnt require second two prohibits discrimination but requires somebody to bring a case. Section five puts on ownous on the discriminator themselves. Theres no other statute wu apply this standard. We dont say because people are aware of gender discrimination. The law certainly has made it better. There has been progress. We have admitted it. The Court Admitted it. Everyones admitted theres progress. Theres still a need. Its what congress focused on in 2006. Its incorrect to pretend we are revolting from 1965. Congress looked at what has been happening in the states covered by section five to determine if its needed. Part of what i loved about reread thg stuff is jeff sessions. 98 members of the senate voted to reauthorize. No member didnt. Jeff sessions of alabama, whose voice sounds to me like seg inauguration. I know thats unfair. He voted to reauthorize the Voting Rights act. I think bouncing off her point here, i think the clam on the other side is like they are using an elephant gun to kill a mouse. 1965, there were actual elephants now there arent elephants. The Progressive Side is saying there are elephants out there. As evidence of the fact there are, let me point you to and this gets to the congressional deference point. 15,000 pages of Record Congress produced for the 2006 renewal. 26 hearings. How much deference does the court have to give to congress . They didnt say we are going rubber stamp it and move on . The additional argument has to be there may be elephants here, but they are not just in the covered jurisdictions. Impeerically, we can show the elephants are more likely in the covered jurisdictions than uncovered. Addition nally, the statute itself gives a bailout prediction that allows them that have a clean nose to opt out. And the bail in. It goes both waits, right. If a jurisdiction isnt covered, it can get put in. We update, basically, the data base and look at the law every few years. It sunsets. Not just 98 to 0 in the senate and overwhelmingly the house signed by republican president s an epic statute adopted with a signature of that president. It was an extraordinary remedy in the 1960s and still remains extraordinary because our constitution was meant to be color blind. A portion of this act come on now, our constitution was absolutely not meant to be color blind. If we are honest about the initial document, it is many things. Color blind is not one of them. It is a living document, a document that allows us to become more perfected over time. That initial document that renders my ancestors is certainly not color blind. Im take thg after the 14th amendment. They say, this is a color blind document. Its taken 100 years to get to a point we are at now. Congress has power and four other amendments say that. Congress, not the court, Congress Gets to make the call. It also says in the process of being adopted, its okay for congress to treat some states differently than other states if they have bad democratic track record. Its built into the 14th amend mtd. We know it is because it comes at a time when we are talking about states that didnt just have a bad track record, but left. Everybody stay here. We have the whole hour. Im going to bring in barbara next. You know when she gets here, nerdland gets hot. When we come back. Try running four. Ning a restaurant is hard, fortunately weve got ink. It gives us 5x the rewards on our internet, phone charges and cable, plus at Office Supply stores. Rewards we put right back into our business. This is the only thing weve ever wanted to do and ink helps us do it. Make your mark with ink from chase. Current events. Comfortable temperature. Biceps. He maintains everything for your pleasure. He has the nicest car you can think of, but longer. With one hand he can roll down 10 windows plus the partition. Everything he does, tacks right off. And of course he dines upon the liquid gold of velveeta shells and cheese. End of story. Liquid gold. Eat like that guy you know. And youll dump your old broom. But dont worry, hell find someone else. Whos that lady . Whos that lady . Sexy lady whos that lady . 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Joining my panel is barbara, president and executive director of lawyers. A Group Representing individuals in these cases. Good to see you. Its a pleasure to be here. We have been talking about shelby, but talk about the arizona case. The arizona case is fascinating. Many people remember in 1993, Congress Passed the motor voter act for the national Voter Registration act. Part of the purpose of that act is to make sure that for federal elections there would be a uniform registration process. It delegated authority to the commission to set up a registration form, which it did. Unfortunately, in 2004, arizona passed a law that added its own requirements requiring proof of citizenship in addition and above to those from the federal form. They thought that wasnt enough. They wanted more. And we, of course, objected on behalf of our clients because this placed a special burden on people in arizona versus the burdens placed on people in other states. Its unlawful, unconstitutional and contrary to the intent of a statute and federal law should preimpt a state law. They knew it when they passed it. This should not be a hard case. Let me pop to the panel. I want to ask about the point barbara made about the federal law autoto preempt the state laws. We have a little bit of evidence from how they decided the Affordable Care act case which narrowed the commerce law piece. Is this basically a states right court . At the end of the day, chief Justice Roberts with an eye toward history avoided a partisan ruling, invalidating this. And i think the four democrat appointees, liberals on the court, justices kagan and sotomayor are in a solidly thickened favor of strong federal protection of Voting Rights. They only need one from the other side. The other side has to fill in. On many occasions, Justice Kennedy crossed over. Chief Justice Roberts, very dramatically in the obama care case. Im optimistic we can get Justice Thomas because they claim teap realists. I think nick gave us a good reminder. Our constitution is not just the founding document, its as amended. The right to vote, 14, 15, 19, 26 and 24. Thank you. Every single one of them says congress should have power to enforce this. Yeah. So, there is broad tradition in our amendments of congressional protection of Voting Rights. Barbara, let me come back to you. Theres a third case that doesnt yet have a date. Its the texas versus u. S. Why doesnt it have a date yet . Well, no one really knows. It may be that the court is waiting to see what it does in other cases. We just dont know. I dont think we should speculate on it. Whats important for people to know about the case is this is the case that follows the redistricting in 2010 in texas where the state gave four congressional districts mainly because 98 of this population increase was due to latinos in that state and drew four new districts that were all white in essence. That split and packed and cracked the latino vote so that people of latino heritage would not be able to elect the candidate of their choice. We represent the mexicanamerican caucus that said its absolutely on constitutional and violates section five. Its just not, you know, good for this country. Guess what . The court held that that action by the Texas Legislature through all those districts in a way no person of latino heritage could be elected by candidates of their choice. That district, that court held that action by the state was purposefully discriminatory. They did it for a discriminatory purpose. They redrew the districts and now there is a district in which latino candidates can be elected by latino population. Sheryl i want to ask you about this because we have been talking agent the voters rights but the other half is representatives, representatives of color to get elected. When we hear stack pack and crack, they are terms of how they are drawn. The texas redistricting feeds into the earlier conversation about title five. They havent been found to violate the rights of minorities, something they do consistently. Its old news. Theres a question about what does section five do that is valuable and important. We have section two to cover the country. You pointed out you have to bring a suit. Congress made the decision we want to stop discrimination before it happens. Let me give you a quick example. You mentioned a city in shelby county. We dont need the Voting Rights act. As a result of section two litigation they created council districts. A black representative was elected for 20 years. Suddenly, as a result of the redistricting, they reduced the black population from 70 to 29 . They dont preclear it. They go ahead with the election. The Justice Department has to do an enforcement action to stop them from undermining the minorities to elect. It happened in 2008, not 1965. This is not ancient history. Bar brarks im going to give you the last ten seconds because i know you have a call to rally to protect Voting Rights happening on the steps of the Supreme Court. The Civil Rights Community because of cases being held are heard on february 27th, this coming wednesday. They have called for people around the country to come and to show their support for the Voting Rights act and not surprisingly people are interested, very determined. We understand whats at stake here. As americans, we know that the fight here is opened a future to this country. Its over weather or not we are going to power, share or power hold illegally. So, the fight is about our making sure that, you know, that this act, the Voting Rights act has the teeth and the ability to prevent discrimination. Imagine, according to the congressional record, over 2,2100 plus violations of Voting Rights acts occurred. If every one of those went to court, what would our country look like . Think of the tension, the horror, the money. This is why section five is beautiful. It prevents discrimination and keeps our country solidly in its goals. Thats where we have the country. We must fight for the future. Barbara will bring the fire, no matter how long she has. Thats why we love having you as a guest. Thank you so much barbara in washington, d. C. Speaking of where we are going as a country and how fair we are going to be, up next, money and politics. The Supreme Court has a lot on its docket. [ male announcer ] Research Suggests cell health plays a key role throughout our lives. 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