An appellate court decision in a voting rights case in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands may weigh heavily on a similar lawsuit here at home on who can vote for Guam’s political status. “This is basic civics; this is fundamental civics that everyone regardless of race has a right to vote,” proclaimed Dr. Ron McNinch of the University of Guam. Shortly before the new year, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a decision on CNMI resident John Davis’ case against the Commonwealth Election Commission. Davis filed a lawsuit alleging a CNMI law “unconstitutionally limit(s) voting on the basis of race.” McNinch broke it down, saying, “The Davis CNMI case, the Davis v. The CEC case is a case about voting over land issues in the CNMI, and the CNMI developed kind of like Guam developed, its own kind of resident, traditional resident only voting process where if you didn’t fit a certain category of voter, you couldn’t vote.
And the Judge (Ramona) Manglona in the CNMI , when she had a hearing on it, she said no, this is not appropriate, it’s a 15th Amendment violation, there’s other violations related to it. So she found, for Mr. Davis that people have a right to vote and then the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upon review, said yeah absolutely, you cannot have in the US in the 15th Amendment, you cannot have a race-based voting process, or a process that excludes people on the basis of race.”
According to the opinion, the CNMI restricts voting in certain elections to individuals of Northern Marianas descent. The appeal relates to whether this restriction is race-based and violates the 15th Amendment. The Ninth Circuit concludes that it does and affirms the judgment of the District Court. The 15th Amendment gives all men, regardless of race, the right to vote.
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