Speech #940117734

That ban is due to expire on August 6. The Voting Rights Extension Act will extend the lifetime of the 1965 law as amended for 10 years and add a number of provisions. First. a permanent ban would be enacted on literacy tests and on other discriminatory voting practices. Second. the bill would prohibit for 7 years. the use of Englishonly election materials in a jurisdiction if more than 5 percent of the residents of voting age are members of a language minority group and if less than 50 percent of the residents of voting age participated in the 1972 Presidential election. If coverage is triggered under the act. then first. election materials must be provided in the language of the minority group that triggered the coverage. and second. the jurisdiction becomes subject to preclearance and to monitoring by Federal registrars and observers.