Historians have long been engaged in telling the story of the
struggle for the vote. In the wake of recent contested elections, the
suppression of the vote has returned to the headlines, as awareness
of the deep structural barriers to the ballot, particularly for poor,
black, and Latino voters, has called attention to the historical
roots of issues related to voting access.
Perhaps most
notably, former state legislator Stacey Abrams's campaign for
Georgia's gubernatorial race drew national attention after she
narrowly lost to then-secretary of state Brian Kemp, who had removed
hundreds of thousands of voters from the official rolls. After her
loss, Abrams created Fair Fight, a multimillion-dollar initiative to
combat voter suppression in twenty states.
At an annual
conference of the Organization of American Historians, leading
scholars Carol Anderson, Kevin M. Kruse, Heather Cox Richardson, and
Heather Anne Thompson had a conversation with Abrams about the long
history of voter suppression at the Library Company of Philadelphia.
This book is a transcript of that extraordinary conversation, edited
by Jim Downs.
Voter Suppression
in U.S. Elections offers an enlightening, history-informed
conversation about voter disenfranchisement in the United States. By
gathering scholars and activists whose work has provided sharp
analyses of this issue, we see how historians in general explore
contentious topics and provide historical context for students and
the broader public.
The book also
includes a "top ten" selection of essays and articles by
such writers as journalist Ari Berman, Pulitzer Prize-winning
historian David Blight, and civil rights icon John Lewis.