[EL] In the spirit of the old listserv

[Gerken, Heather]

All,

In the spirit of the old listserv, I'm writing to ask a non-rhetorical question.  A political scientist at Yale, Eitan Hersh, is doing research on the racial identifiers that are public record on the voter files in eight southern states.  He's trying to identify the origin of these racial identifiers.  Some people think that they are tied to VRA data collection requirements, but Hersh hasn't found any evidence of that suggestion.  Moreover, the collection of the data in some of the states predates the VRA, and  some covered jurisdictions don't collect reach information on the voter files, while others do.  It's an interesting question, and I was hoping that the many lawyers and academics on the list who were involved in the early cases might have an answer for Professor Hersh. The paper can be found her, http://www.eitanhersh.com/uploads/7/9/7/5/7975685/racialized_electioneering.pdf.  If you happen to have a lead, I'd appreciate off-list answers that I could forward to Professor Hersh.

Many thanks,

Heather Gerken



Heather Gerken
J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law
Yale Law School
127 Wall Street
New Haven CT  06511
ph (203) 432-8022
fax (203) 432-8095
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