"It's a lot easier to change a law than to change a human heart," President Bush told the NAACP last week. "I understand that many African-Americans distrust my political party."

Ya think?

With the President's promise to sign it, Congress recently voted to extend the historic Voting Rights Act of 1965 another 25 years, affirming its protections of minorities and adding some provisions. This time, the vote was unanimous in the Senate, 98-0, with two members absent, and in the House the vote was 390-33. Among the relatively small group of Republican white guys voting against the measure -- Maryland's 6th District Republican Roscoe Bartlett.

The 6th District covers western Maryland, plus Frederick County, Carroll and parts of Harford. You would think even conservative voters would see the value in the renewal of an act that was the centerpiece of the civil rights movement and opened the polling precincts up to minorities who had been intimidated -- with poll taxes and literacy tests -- from voting for generations.

But ole Roscoe apparently thinks we've fixed racism pretty much now and that there's no reason -- even as his president and his party try to convince black voters to consider Republican candidates -- to affirm and renew this important law. Here's the statement I got from his spokesperson, Lisa Wright:

"Congressman Bartlett decides how to vote on bills -- not based upon the names of bills -- but their content. He said the systemic and structural racism by some local and state governments that required the prescriptive medicine of the federal Voting Rights Act in 1964 and 1982 no longer exist.  From his experience as a medical school professor, he noted that you don't keep taking the same medicine or continue the same treatment when the underlying conditions have changed.    The medicine that helped formerly can do harm prospectively.  He studied the reauthorization provisions carefully and concluded they didn't reflect current realities to protect the right of all American citizens in every jurisdiction to have the opportunity to vote."

Harm? Extending the Voting Rights Act would harm someone? It might have inconvenienced certain states with a long history of discrimination, but the greatest value was in the symbolic power of its affirmation -- particularly for the GOP. With those 33 votes against -- all Republicans -- they didn't exactly restore their image as the party of Lincoln. Way to go, Roscoe!