South Dakota: report details state's voting-rights shortcomings
The Rapid City Journal reports: American Indians in South Dakota continued to be denied fundamental voting rights, even as the U.S. Congress works to renew right-to-vote guarantees that are more than 40 years old, members of a civil-rights coalition said Wednesday.
“In the past 40 years, South Dakota has become a battleground for American Indian voting rights,” said Janine Pease, vice president of American Indian Affairs at Rocky Mountain College in Billings, Mont.
Pease, a member of the Crow Indian Tribe, is the author of “Voting Rights in South Dakota 1982-2006,” a compilation of allegations and examples of discriminatory actions and policies toward American Indians in the state. She spoke to reporters during a teleconference conference call that also included former Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D., and Wade Henderson, executive director of the Leadership Conference for Civil Rights.
The report by Pease was commissioned by the Leadership Conference for Civil Rights Education Fund. It comes as Congress faces the renewal of key provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the landmark legislation signed by President Lyndon Johnson to break down barriers to minority voting. -- The Rapid City Journal