Listmembers might be interested to know that Senator Obama's deeply thoughtful and knowledgable comments about the Voting Rights Act (quoted by Rick Hasen) renewal issues are not just those of an exceptionally smart and serious politician.  Sen. Obama also taught a course on "The Law of Democracy" as an adjunct professor at the University of Chicago Law School.  As other users of our casebook know, it includes extensive material on the Voting Rights Act, including on the issues raised by Section 5 of the Act, which Sen. Obama's comments addressed.  Partly because of his underappreciated stint as a professor in this field, and partly for other reasons, Sen. Obama thus had considerable knowledge about voting rights and election-law issues before he entered the Senate.

 

Richard Pildes
Visiting Professor, Harvard Law School, Feb-June 2006
phone:  617-496-7353
fax:  617-496-4863

Sudler Family Professor of Constitutional Law
Co-Director, NYU Center on Law and Security
NYU School of Law
40 Washington Sq. So.  NYC, NY 10012
phone:  212 998-6377
fax:  212 995-3662