In this week’s issue of THE NEW YORKER, legal correspondent Jeffrey Toobin gives America a wakeup-call regarding the future of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. While we imagine the landmark legislation to be one of the pillars of civil rights-era racial advancement, it’s not a permanent fix to the problem of disenfranchisement in minority communities. Toobin previews a case to be decided in the upcoming Supreme Court term that will address the constitutionality of a provision that requires certain jurisdictions to check with the Justice Department before changing around their voting practices. The law in question, Section 5 of the Act, was intended to prevent the kind of Poll-Taxing and Grandfather Clause-ing that kept blacks from voting freely and fairly for decades. But now, plaintiffs claim that Barack Obama’s “post-racial” America means these jurisdictions (overrepresented in the south) should be let off the hook.

Not so fast:

Republican political leadership has continually been interested in limiting voter access in the name of upholding voter legitimacy. But Toobin seems to have the better argument here. And, as we saw in campaign 2008 (and 2004, and 2000—definitely 2000) this real problem of disparate voting practices will compete, as a partisan talking point, with the mostly nonexistent problem of voter fraud—unless comprehensive reform gets underway. Toobin offers some concrete solutions at the level of jurisprudence; community groups that seek to raise awareness and lobby for better equipment and equal access also do their part (actor Charles Dutton, Professor Lani Gunier, and Rep. John Lewis all weigh in on this film about restoring voting rights).

If Dick Cheney can fight to the death for felon Scooter Libby’s re-enfranchisement, the American public can certainly stand up for more access to the most precious feature of our democracy.