Protecting the Right to Vote

Fifty-six years ago, on August 6, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law the Voting Rights Act. It is rightly remembered as a landmark in the struggle for equal rights, but the labor of protecting the vote continues even now. This week, senators are reportedly working furiously behind the scenes to ready revisions of S. 1, the “For the People Act,” for adoption before next week’s recess. The bill and its House counterpart, H.R. 1, seemed all but dead in June when Sen. Joe Manchin, the West Virginia moderate Democrat, declared that he would vote against it—but...