"Voting Rights Act Renewal on Pace for May Passage"
Roll Call offers this breaking news report 
(http://rollcall.com/issues/1_1/breakingnews/13050-1.html), which 
begins: "House Judiciary Chairman Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) said 
Thursday that he believes reauthorization of the landmark 1965 Voting 
Rights Act could be completed as soon as late May now that the Senate 
and House Judiciary panels have agreed to introduce identical 
legislation early next week. The Wisconsin lawmaker confirmed the 
agreement following a Senate Judiciary hearing on the VRA, and he said 
identical bills are slated to be introduced in both chambers Tuesday." 
See also this press release 
(http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=64742). Once I'm 
back from my DC conference, I'll write more about what these events 
mean for possible constitutional challenges to the Act.