More than 80 years after Lonnie E. Smith challenged Texas’ discriminatory white primary, the state is experiencing a historic political shift. As Democrats notch major victories and Black leaders make history, the fight over voting access and political representation continues.
By Shelby Stewart
Essence
https://www.essence.com/
In 1940, a Black Houston dentist named Lonnie E. Smith attempted to cast his ballot in the Democratic primary election in Harris County. But when he arrived at his polling place, Smith was denied the opportunity to vote because he was Black. At the time, Texas operated under a discriminatory practice known as the white primary, which barred Black residents from participating in Democratic primary elections. In a state where winning the Democratic nomination often determined who would ultimately hold public office, the exclusion effectively shut Black Texans out of a critical part of the political process.
Rather than accept the denial, Smith challenged the practice in court, with support from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and its legal team, which included future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. His fight ultimately reached the nation’s highest court. On April 3, 1944, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in Smith’s favor in Smith v. Allwright, declaring Texas’ white primary system unconstitutional. The landmark decision marked a significant victory in the fight for Black political participation, although other discriminatory practices, including poll taxes and voter intimidation, continued to restrict access to the ballot for generations.
More than eight decades later, Texas has reached another pivotal moment in its political history. On November 3, Democrats made history at the ballot box, flipping the U.S. Senate seat and governor’s office while securing victories in several other major statewide races. State Rep. James Talarico defeated Republican Ken Paxton, becoming the first Democrat elected to the U.S. Senate from Texas since 1988. State Rep. Gina Hinojosa also defeated incumbent Gov. Greg Abbott, ending three decades of Republican control of the governor’s office and making history as the first Latina elected governor of Texas.
Talk about a Texas-sized contradiction: As immigrant communities across the state face heightened ICE enforcement and intimidation, Texans have elected the state’s first Latina governor. It’s a historic milestone, and a reminder that Texas can hold contradictions like few other places. (Such as a felon being in the nation’s highest office).
And the victories extended well beyond the governor’s mansion and the U.S. Senate. Democrats also made significant gains down the ballot, including the election of Letitia Plummer as Harris County judge. Plummer will make history as the first Black woman to hold the position, becoming the county’s top elected official and taking the helm of one of the largest counties in the country. In Tarrant County, Alisa Simmons also made history, defeating the incumbent to become the county’s first Black woman judge. And in Dallas, pastor Frederick Douglas Haynes III was elected to represent the 30th Congressional District, succeeding Jasmine Crockett in the U.S. House.
For a long time, Texas has been considered a Republican state. Democrats hadn’t won a statewide race since 1994. So this election isn’t just a big night for the party. It’s a moment that makes people reconsider what might be possible.
Yet, the fight over the vote isn’t always as straightforward as getting people to the polls. Sometimes, it happens long before Election Day, in the drawing of district lines and the laws that determine how, when and where people can cast a ballot. Texas has become a familiar battleground in that fight. In 2025, lawmakers approved a new congressional map designed to create five additional Republican-leaning seats, prompting civil rights groups, including the NAACP, to challenge the boundaries over concerns that they would weaken the political power of Black and Latino voters. The map ultimately remained in place for the 2026 elections after a legal battle that reached the U.S. Supreme Court.
And redistricting is only one aspect. Texas has also enacted voting restrictions that have changed how residents access the ballot, including tighter mail-in voting rules and the elimination of practices like 24-hour and drive-through voting. These barriers don’t always look like someone being turned away at a polling location. Sometimes, they show up in a rejected ballot application, a longer trip to vote or a district drawn in a way that makes it harder for a community’s collective voice to translate into political representation. More than 80 years after Lonnie E. Smith challenged the white primary, the fight over the power of the Black vote is still playing out—though the obstacles don’t always look the same.
However, the results also bring Black women and their political influence back into the forefront. In 2024, an estimated 92 percent of Black women voters cast their ballots for Kamala Harris, according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. Yet Harris’ loss was an emotional one felt by majority Black women, who despite their best efforts, still couldn’t pull out a win. This year’s midterms offered another opportunity to see how Black communities would show up, particularly in Texas, where early voting increased in predominantly Black Houston neighborhoods like Acres Homes, Sunnyside and Tidwell. While the final numbers will tell us more about who turned out, one thing is clear: Black women’s political participation remains an important part of any conversation about where this country—and Texas—goes next.
Across the state, Texans turned out in substantial numbers ahead of Election Day. More than 7.7 million ballots were cast before November 3, including mail-in votes, while Harris County surpassed its previous midterm voting record with more than 1.39 million ballots cast. In predominantly Black Houston communities, early voting had already shown notable increases compared with the 2022 midterms.
For Black Texans, particularly Black women, showing up at the polls is about more than the outcome of a single election. It is also an opportunity to exercise a right that previous generations fought to secure while helping determine the policies, leadership and future of the communities they call home. And in a state where a Black Houstonian once had to take his fight for the right to vote all the way to the Supreme Court, the significance of that participation is that history is never far from the present. More than 80 years after Lonnie E. Smith challenged a system designed to keep Black Texans from the ballot box, their voices remain an essential part of the state’s political story. The fight for access may look different today, but the responsibility—and the power—to shape what comes next remains.
And Texas wasn’t the only state making headlines. From the South to the Midwest, Democrats picked up victories in places that have long been considered Republican strongholds. Georgia elected Keisha Lance Bottoms as the country’s first Black woman governor, while Iowa and Ohio also elected Democratic governors for the first time in years. Democrats flipped Republican-held Senate seats in North Carolina and South Carolina, as well as Kansas, Iowa and Ohio. The party also made gains in state legislatures, picking up chambers in Georgia, North Carolina, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.
The results point to something bigger than a few unexpected election-night victories. Voters across the country sent a message about the direction they want their leadership to take, with economic concerns, dissatisfaction with the current administration and demands for greater accountability among the issues shaping the conversation. For Democrats, the gains represent an opening in places where the party has struggled to compete. For the country, they raise a larger question about whether the political map many have grown accustomed to is beginning to look different.
The distance between Lonnie E. Smith’s fight in 1940 and the political shift witnessed in 2026 is measured in generations of organizing, resistance and people determined to make their voices heard. The obstacles have evolved: from poll taxes and literacy tests to restrictive voting laws and district maps that can dilute the influence of entire communities, but the stakes remain familiar. This election, Democrats mounted an ambitious effort to compete in House and Senate races across the country, including in traditionally Republican states, and ultimately reclaimed control of both chambers.
That outcome does not erase the barriers that remain, nor does it mean the fight for equal political representation is over. It does, however, underscore what generations of voters have made clear: You can redraw the lines, change the rules and make the road to the ballot more difficult, but you cannot assume people will stop demanding to be heard. Maybe it’s time for America to sing a new tune.
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