Voting Rights Act Stories

A list of the most recent stories about Voting Rights Act.

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KPN shareholders approve E-Plus sale

Shareholders of Dutch telecom Royal KPN NV blasted company managers for their recent performance at a meeting Wednesday but approved the sale of the company's German mobile subsidiary, E-Plus, for $11.4 billion to Telefonica SA of Spain. CEO Eelco Blok declined to comment on negotiations between KPN and Mexican billionaire ...

North Carolina editorial roundup

Recent editorials from North Carolina newspapers: Sept. 30 News and Observer, Raleigh, N.C., on US government's move to stop NC voter suppression sad but necessary: To the list of horribles delivered upon North Carolina's good name by this current crop of Republicans now can be added the humiliation of being ...

FILE - In a June 30, 1982 file photo, President Ronald Reagan signs an expansion of the 1965 Voting Rights Bill during a ceremony in the East Room of the White House. Standing from left: Sens. Robert Dole (R-Kan.); Howard Baker (R-Tenn.); Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.); and Dennis DeConcini (D-Ariz.) The Justice Department will sue the state of North Carolina for alleged racial discrimination over tough new voting rules, the latest effort by the Obama administration to fight back against a Supreme Court decision that struck down the most powerful part of the landmark Voting Rights Act and freed southern states from strict federal oversight of their elections. North Carolina has a new law scaling back the period for early voting and imposing stringent voter identification requirements. It is among at least five Southern states adopting stricter voter ID and other election laws. (AP Photo, File)

NC Republicans vow to fight US DOJ over voter laws

North Carolina's Republican governor is vowing to fight a lawsuit by the U.S. Justice Department challenging the state's tough new elections law on the grounds it disproportionately excludes minority voters. Gov. Pat McCrory said Monday he has hired a private lawyer to help defend the new law from what he ...

The Rev. Joseph Lowery, right, escorts his wife Evelyn to a waiting limousine as marchers on the way to Washington, D.C., complete a short walk at the start of their journey on April 20, 1982, in Tuskegee, Ala.

Evelyn Gibson Lowery Timeline: 1925-2013

Lowery timeline In 1985, Evelyn Lowery said, “I wouldn’t give anything for the experiences I’ve had.” Here are some of the highlights: 1947 — She meets the Rev. Joseph E. Lowery. They marry April 5, 1948. 1953-62 — The Lowerys live in Mobile, Ala. Joseph Lowery, a Methodist minister, travels ...

Civil rights leader Joseph Lowery, shown recently in his Atlanta home, will celebrate his 92nd birthday in October. The oil painting behind him includes his image along with that of his friend, the slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King, and the first African-America president, Barack Obama. Its inscription says “to be a witness.”

Lowery prepared to mark a birthday as others celebrate his legacy

Two Sundays from now, the Rev. Joseph Lowery will gather with admirers and well-wishers to celebrate his 92nd birthday. To some, his age renders him just an old man, but nary a day passes when Lowery isn’t busy preaching and prodding America toward her best self. Still, he admits time ...

President Barack Obama arrives on the South Lawn of the White House on Friday, Sept. 20, 2013 in Washington. Obama traveled to a Ford plant in Liberty, Mo., to promote his economic policies. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)

Obama urges people to push stalled gun legislation

Days after mass shootings in both of his hometowns, President Barack Obama urged his most ardent supporters Saturday "to get back up and go back at it" and help push stalled legislation out of Congress so dangerous people won't get their hands on guns. "We can't rest until all of ...

FILE - In this March 15, 2013 photo made available by the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, Pope Francis is greeted by Cardinal Timothy Dolan as he meets the Cardinals for the first time after his election at the Vatican. In an interview published Thursday, Sept. 19, 2013 in 16 Jesuit journals worldwide, Pope Francis called the church’s focus on abortion, marriage and contraception narrow and said it was driving people away. Now, the U.S. bishops face a challenge to rethink a strategy many considered essential for preserving the faith. Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said he thought the pope was telling everyone - inside and outside the church - to focus less on divisive social issues. (AP Photo/L'Osservatore Romano, ho)

Pope's blunt remarks pose challenge for bishops

In recent years, many American bishops have drawn a harder line with parishioners on what could be considered truly Roman Catholic, adopting a more aggressive style of correction and telling abortion rights supporters to stay away from the sacrament of Communion. Liberal-minded Catholics derided the approach as tone-deaf. Church leaders ...

AP News in Brief at 5:58 a.m. EDT

'I felt him breathe': Before memorable photos, a frantic escape from Navy Yard's Building 197 WASHINGTON (AP) — The first bang sounded distant and muffled. On the fourth floor, Bertillia Lavern assumed somebody downstairs was setting up for an event and had dropped a folding table. But when the bangs ...

In this Aug. 22, 2013, photo a semi-automatic handgun and a holster are displayed at a North Little Rock, Ark., gun shop. Even as the debate over tightening national gun control laws is rekindled after the latest mass shooting, a growing number of Americans are questioning the federal government’s stewardship of the right to bear arms, according to a poll by the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. (AP Photo/Danny Johnston)

Gov't gets poor marks on protecting gun rights

A New Jersey college student wants Congress to stand strong against tougher gun laws. A Colorado software executive thinks the federal government goes too far in protecting gun rights. A child-care worker in Wisconsin just wants the shootings in her city to stop. Even as the debate over tightening national ...

Churchgoers file outside the church as a wreath is carried at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala., Sunday, Sept. 15, 2013. The congregation gathered outside the church for the wreath laying ceremony at the spot where a bomb was detonated 50 years ago by the Ku Klux Klan, killing four young girls. (AP Photo/Hal Yeager)

Alabama church marks 50th anniversary of bombing

Hundreds of people black and white, many holding hands, filled an Alabama church that was bombed by the Ku Klux Klan 50 years ago Sunday to mark the anniversary of the blast that killed four little girls and became a landmark moment in the civil rights struggle. The Rev. Arthur ...

By delaying Syria vote, Obama keeps leverage

If you’re an average American and are confused and worried about our getting embroiled in a no-win Syrian civil war, you’re right to be concerned. It means you’re paying attention. But if you’re a member of Congress who’s still wondering whether to grant President Barack Obama the authority to use ...

KPN board breaks silence and confirms Movil bid

Dutch telecoms firm KPN NV broke a month's silence Thursday and confirmed that it is in talks with Carlos Slim's America Movil over a takeover bid. Last month, Movil said it planned to launch a 7.2 billion euro ($9.5 billion) offer for the 70 percent of Royal KPN NV it ...

President and CEO of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Lawrence Pijeaux, front, lays on a table the Congressional Gold Medal posthumously awarded in honor of Addie Mae Collins, Denise McNair, Carole Robertson, and Cynthia Wesley, the four young black girls who lost their lives in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, on September 15, 1963, presented by Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner, back center, during a ceremony at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, Sept. 10, 2013. Others are, Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., from back left, Rep. Terri Sewell, D-Ala., Boehner, Senate Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., obscured, unidentified, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Congress honors Birmingham church bombing victims

House and Senate leaders on Tuesday awarded Congress' highest civilian honor to four girls killed in the Alabama church bombing nearly 50 years ago that became a watershed moment in the civil rights movement. The Congressional Gold Medal went to Addie Mae Collins, Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley, who were ...

Congress honors Birmingham church bombing victims

House and Senate leaders on Tuesday awarded Congress’ highest civilian honor to four girls killed in the Alabama church bombing nearly 50 years ago that became a watershed moment in the civil rights movement. The Congressional Gold Medal went to Addie Mae Collins, Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley, who were ...

50 years later, Congress honors Birmingham bombing victims

In life, Addie Mae Collins, Denise McNair, Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley were young girls with typical interests, such as landscape drawings and the school band. In death, they inspired a nation and helped galvanize Congress to pass a landmark civil rights bill. Fifty years after their lives were cut ...

NAACP launching search for new leader

The next president of the nation's largest and oldest civil rights group needs to be energetic, charismatic and willing to make a personal sacrifice, NAACP leaders say. The group's board is beginning its search for a successor to outgoing President and CEO Benjamin Jealous, who announced this week that he ...

NAACP preparing committee to search for new CEO

Leaders of the nation's largest civil rights group pledged to continue fighting for voting rights, health care, a higher minimum wage and immigration reform, even as the NAACP begins searching for a new president and CEO. After suffering turbulent leadership changes and scandals in the past, NAACP board members said ...

NAACP President Ben Jealous to step down this year

NAACP President and CEO Benjamin Jealous, who is credited with boosting finances at the nation's largest civil rights organization and helping to stabilize it, said Sunday that he plans to step down at the end of the year. The Baltimore-based National Association for the Advancement of Colored People said that ...

Obama: Economic inequality is King’s dream unfinished

President Barack Obama told thousands who gathered on the National Mall on Wednesday that while fallen racial barriers represent great strides toward the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 50-year-old dream, economic inequality remains the nation’s “great unfinished business.”Presenting a striking tableau, the nation’s first black president spoke from the Abraham ...

Obama says jobs, inequality the “great unfinished business” of 1963

In the half-century since the March on Washington, the walls of official segregation have come tumbling down, but inequality has worsened. President Barack Obama said today at the Lincoln Memorial that the decades since the 1963 “March for Jobs and Freedom” have not delivered on the name’s first demand. “The ...

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