Imagine if a Republican president's attorney general dropped charges against Klansmen who staked out polling places in hoods, carrying weapons, after a federal judge had ruled that the Department of Justice career prosecutors had won their case. Yet that is exactly what Obama AG Eric Holder did in a case involving the New Black Panther Party.

The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is expected to approve Friday the sending of a second letter to the Justice Department, asking it to justify its decision in May to drop charges against members of the New Black Panther Party accused of intimidating voters at a Philadelphia polling place in the November election.

Martin Dannenfelser, staff director, said a majority of the commissioners were not satisfied with a response by the department to a June 16 letter, in which the commission said the decision to drop the case had caused it "great confusion" since the NBPP members were "caught on video blocking access to the polls, and physically threatening and verbally harassing voters."

That letter said that even after a federal judge ruled that the department had won the case since the NBPP members failed to appear it court, it "took the unusual move of voluntarily dismissing the charges," which, it said, sent "the wrong message entirely - that attempts at voter suppression will be tolerated and will not be vigorously prosecuted so long as the groups or individuals who engage in them fail to respond to the charges."

Mr. Dannenfelser said the commission, an independent fact-finding body, could hold hearings on its own in the case and call witnesses to testify, or it could conduct its own inquiry and make referrals for action to the federal government.