Eric Davis: High Court hears census case

On Monday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case about the Trump Administration’s plan to exclude undocumented immigrants from the census population counts used to determine the apportionment of seats in the U.S. House among the states. The origins of this case go back to the founding of the United States.  The Constitution of 1787 included the infamous “three-fifths clause,” which stated that House seats would be apportioned among the states on the basis of “the whole number of free persons” and … (read more)

Political party organizations are already starting to focus on the 2022 elections for the U.S. Senate and House, even though some contests from the 2020 cycle are still unresolved. The final partisan breakdown of the 117th Congress, to convene in January, … (read more)

MIDDLEBURY — Vermont’s 2020 election results are in, resulting in a little shakeup in the current roster of top state officials. Democrat Molly Gray will succeed Lt. Gov. David Zuckerman, who was unsuccessful in his effort to unseat Gov. Phil Scott. But p … (read more)

More than 260,000 Vermonters voted early this year, by returning the absentee ballots they were mailed in late September and early October. With General Election ballots mailed to all voters, and with town and city clerks allowed to begin processing those … (read more)

Many reputable national polls conducted over the past two weeks show former Vice President Joe Biden with a lead of about 10 percent over President Donald Trump. A gap of this magnitude is larger than the margin of polling error, so a popular vote victory … (read more)

Sen. Patrick Toomey, a Pennsylvania Republican, announced on Monday that he will not be a candidate for re-election when his term ends in 2022. He also stated that he will not be a candidate for governor of Pennsylvania in 2022. Toomey said one of the rea … (read more)

The death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg marks the sixteenth time there has been a vacancy on the Supreme Court in a presidential election year. The vacancy in Ginsburg’s seat comes the second closest to the election of any of these vacancies, which date … (read more)

The Vermont Secretary of State’s Office will begin mailing General Election ballots to voters at the end of next week. All active registered voters in Vermont will receive a ballot by mail between Sept. 21 and Oct. 1.  Active registered voters are those w … (read more)

Voters in Massachusetts will cast their ballots in that state’s primary election over the next several days, by mail, at early voting sites, and at the polls next Tuesday. Turnout is expected to be high, with over 1 million voters already requesting mail … (read more)

With less than three months remaining before Election Day, what do polls tell us about the current state of the presidential campaign? Most high-quality national polls taken within the past few weeks show Joe Biden with a 7-to-9 point lead over Donald Tru … (read more)

With 12 days still to go until Vermont’s Aug. 11 primary election, more voters have requested absentee ballots for the primary than voted both in person and by mail in the 2016 and 2018 primaries. More than 150,000 voters may end up requesting absentee ba … (read more)

As of Monday afternoon, almost 82,000 Vermont voters had already requested a mail ballot for the Aug. 11 primary election. With nearly a month to go until the primary, mail ballot turnout this year could well exceed the 119,000 who voted by mail and in pe … (read more)

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson in August of that year, just a few months after the “Bloody Sunday” attack by Alabama police on voting rights marchers at the Edmund Pettus Bridge near Selma.  A major provision … (read more)

Voters in the state of New Mexico mailed in their ballots, or went to the polls, in a primary election held earlier this month. The winners of both the Democratic and Republican primaries in all three of New Mexico’s U.S. House districts were women.  New … (read more)

In 1871, the Reconstruction-era Congress passed an act known as the Civil Rights Act. This statute was designed to counteract attacks on the rights of newly freed slaves in the South, particularly by the Ku Klux Klan. President Grant asked Congress to pro … (read more)