 Among the most effective and important pieces of legislation to come out of the Civil Rights Movement was the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA). The act effected a “quiet revolution” (Davidson and Grofman 1994) in the political systems of southern states by greatly reducing the legal power those states had traditionally enjoyed to determine the rules by which their electoral systems operated. The broad consensus among historians and political scientists is that the VRA put an end to the massive disenfranchisement of southern blacks, as black voter registration rates increased exponentially across Southern states in just a few years after enactment (Wright 2013: 183). Additionally, studies have shown that, with the help of persistent litigation based on the act, the number of black elected officials, especially at the local level, increased substantially (184). In his assessment of the effects of the VRA, Wright concludes that “it is undeniable that local political participation [by blacks] generated positive change in aspects important to [their] communities and their members … . [b]y ensuring that gains from economic growth would be more broadly shared” than would otherwise have been the case (184). Those gains included the provision of basic public services that many black communities in the South had been previously denied due to discrimination, services such as paved roads, streetlights, fire stations, and sewage treatment facilities.