An Eastern Shore town must confront its racist voting system
Nearly 40 years ago, a series of lawsuits were filed by the U.S. Department of Justice and civil rights advocates against Eastern Shore towns and counties with a history of voter discrimination. All of the towns had deep segregationist roots, and all had failed to elect Black candidates to public office, despite having significant number of African American residents. They had clearly violated the Voting Rights Act, the landmark 1965 federal legislation that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. The eventual remedy? One by one, the offenders were required to create at least one representative district where Black voters would hold a majority, thus creating an opportunity for minority candidates to have a place at the governance table.
That effort, supported by the American Civil Liberties Union and others, was eventually rewarded as town halls and county courthouses became integrated. One of the more notable pioneers was Rudolph C. Cane of the tiny Somerset County town of Marion Station. Cane grew up hearing cautionary stories of lynchings, but went on to be elected to the Maryland House of Delegates in 1998 representing Dorchester and Wicomico counties and later serving as chair of the General Assembly’s Legislative Black Caucus.
Even in the most rural and politically conservative parts of Maryland, progress has been evident. And given more recent barriers broken in this state, including the election of Wes Moore as governor and Anthony Brown as state attorney general last fall (both the first Black men to serve in their respective offices), some might assume that the day of court-supervised settlements of Voting Rights
Act cases was a thing of the past here.
Not so fast.
On Tuesday, beginning at 9:30 a.m. at the Edward A. Garmatz U.S. Courthouse in Baltimore, U.S. District Judge Stephanie A. Gallagher is set to hear oral arguments in a case that would require these very same voting standards be placed on the town of Federalsburg, a community
of roughly 2,800 residents in southern Caroline County. The town, which is governed by a mayor and four-member Town Council, all of whom are elected at-large and under staggered terms, has never elected a Black person to office. According to the 2020 U.S. census, Federalsburg’s population is 47% Black.
Why Federalsburg hasn’t adopted at least one majority Black voting district before now may be at least partially the result of how easily it can be overlooked by outsiders. The town is relatively isolated; it’s not on highways serving the beach-bound, like U.S. 50 or Route 404. And it is poor, with average individual income at $19,000 compared with the statewide average of $41,516. But this lack of representation has become all the more glaring as its Black population has grown. Twenty years ago, Black individuals represented only about one-third of the town’s population; today, nearly half.
Representatives of the ACLU and fellow plaintiffs are asking Judge Gallagher to force the town to abandon its past practices and create at least one of two districts (or two of four overall districts) where Black voters would constitute a majority. Further, they are asking the judge to end the practice of staggered elections, which would allow
white people to control the Town Council beyond the scheduled September election. ACLU attorneys say Federalsburg has, in negotiations to date, mostly sought to slow down the proceedings, volunteering to eventually amend the town charter, a proposal that would first have to be approved by a majority of voters.
The town’s failure to settle the matter should infuriate local residents — the cost of litigation is high, and the chances of the town winning in court small, given the history here. (Of course, it’s possible the conservative majority of the U.S. Supreme Court may have some say on the matter. But a pending case, Allen v. Milligan, regarding the addition of a minority-majority congressional district in Alabama, seems unlikely to wholly overturn the bedrock civil rights law.)
Our advice to Federalsburg: Make history and agree to be part of an inclusive 21st century. This year marks the 200th anniversary of the town’s founding in 1823, and there would surely be no better way to demonstrate to the rest of Maryland, and the nation, that Federalsburg is a decent, welcoming and law-abiding community that wants to finally include its long-neglected Black residents in its governance.