The Importance Of Voting Rights In America

Equal rights have long been sought out by the people of America and they continue to be chased after today. Several of our freedoms were originally seen by the Constitutional to be inalienable, so ingrained in what the founding fathers saw as American values that the Bill of Rights has set them in stone. Unfortunately for some, universal suffrage was not one of those rights. While voting was largely limited at the founding of America, citizens, namely white males, slowly gained the right to vote without discrimination towards age or social status. However, women remained barred from the ballot, regardless of race. Though the suffrage movement started as a woman’s social movement, it evolved into a driving force that would hold the power to put in place a nineteenth constitutional amendment.

Throughout America’s history the franchise has been withheld from different groups. This has been possible due to weakly written laws that do not provide adequate protections. In 1965 PL 89-110 was passed, this law, commonly known as the Voting Rights Act of 1965, finally provided real protections for minorities living in southern states. In recent years the language of the law was modified within the Supreme Court to take away the law’s primary power. In the following mock Congressional testimony we will go back to 1848, 13 years before the American Civil War, and provide evidence of why a law like PL 89-110 is necessary and commendable.

Following the Civil War and freeing of slaves all over America a new question arose: Should black people be able to vote? Further, were they even citizens in the fullest sense? Now freed from slavery, black Americans found themselves in a political limbo where they were no longer property but not fully citizens. In an effort to extend protection from discrimination at the poll booth, an amendment to the Constitution was passed declaring it unlawful to deny voting on account of race. This amendment, however, was met with unprecedented resistance. Suppression of the black vote was just one step in preventing black Americans from being treated as citizens.

The act focuses on the views of millions Americans and is widely regarded as the crowning achievement of the civil rights movement. This book describes the tale of African Americans still fighting heated battles over race, representation, and political power, with lawmakers devising new strategies to keep minorities out of the voting booth and with the Supreme Court declaring a key part of the Voting Rights Act unconstitutional.

Beginning with the passing of the 15th Amendment in 1869, minority voting rights has had a lengthy history in America. In 1896, Louisiana “grandfather clauses” kept former slaves and

Voting rights have been a constant struggle for most people in America. During the eighteenth century, only property owning white men were able to vote. This means that the colored individuals and women were excluded from the basic right to vote. The southern white society deeply opposed the idea of African Americans voting, creating discriminating legislations furthering the problem in a society dominated by White Americans. Lyndon B. Johnson outlines the differences between the law and justice and emphasize the fact that laws must be questioned in order for justice to be served. Laws are created for an equal platform for all citizens of America but some laws do not encompass the entire situation to serve justice.

Shaw provides a good point when he states: “Going through rehabilitation and reintegration, ex-felons become part of a law-abiding society with the same privileges as others in the society, proponents for voting rights argue.” If they go through these things to become a part of society again, then why are they not allowed the right to vote? This must be an upsetting process for those felons that want to become a part of society again and actually care to make a difference. All that they want to do is to be granted one of the basic fundamental rights guaranteed to citizens. I mean that’s the least they should get after going through the process that they do. It is only fair for them to obtain the right to vote again because at the end of the day they did what was required of them to become a part of society again and what is the use of that if they cannot even vote?

In today’s American society, the right to vote is often taken for granted but it is important to remember that this basic right was not always granted to everyone. In years past, African Americans and women faced many obstacles when trying to obtain the right to vote. The Civil War, otherwise known as the War Between the States, brought about many changes within the United States of America. One of the most significant changes resulting from this time of war was the expansion of voting rights to more citizens. The Fifteenth Amendment, which was passed after the Civil War, forbids the federal and state governments from denying a citizen of the United States the right to vote based on that citizen's "race, color, or previous condition of

Legally, the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment just a few years after the close of the Civil War, African American men had the right to vote according to the United States Constitution. However, racial relations in the south had deteriorated so greatly that even such constitutionally-protected elements of their lives were unable to survive. Whites passed a number of laws designed to disenfranchise African American men, knowing that without the right to vote, the voices of newly-freed slaves would not be heard. These laws included such measures as literacy tests, poll taxes, property qualifications, and so-called “grandfather” clauses that denied an individual the right to vote if their grandfather did not vote himself. Race relations in the south had deteriorated so rapidly that even something as basic as voting, something that was to be provided to African American men according to the United States Constitution, was denied them (“The state…”, 2011).

On August 6, 1965 President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the Voters Rights Act. Signed into law during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, it overcame legal barriers from states and local government agencies aimed at blocking African Americans from voting; a right guaranteed by the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution

The Voting Rights Act 42 U.S.C. §§ 1973 et seq., decision is important regarding the laws governing voting rights and their relationship to minority voters. Its implication and effects however does not end within the legal realms and dimensions but continues through to society, culture, and human rights. The Voting Rights Act initially established in 1965 under Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration protected “racial minorities” from biased voting practices. It was a huge stride in the civil rights movement and a victory over harmful, archaic, and biased voting practices and traditions.

“This act flows from a clear and simple wrong, its only purpose is to right that wrong. Millions of Americans are denied the right to vote because of their color. This law will ensure them the right to vote. The wrong is one which no American, in his heart, can justify. The right is one which no American, true to our principles, can deny.... It is not just a question of guilt, although there is that. It is that men cannot live with a lie and not be stained by it, “said the president (Equal Citizenship and the Individual Right to Vote). The Voting Rights Act was “one of the most monumental laws in the entire history of American freedom”—a law that, very exclusively, aimed to break down the legal barriers at the state and local governments’ level of authority that prohibited African Americans from exercising their constitutional right to vote.

The United States has a troubled history of voter suppression. Prior to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, many states used policies such as poll taxes and literacy tests to prevent African Americans from voting. Even after the voting barriers of the Jim Crow era were removed more than 50 years ago, some lawmakers continue to pursue policies that would undermine our nation’s progress.

One of those alterations allowed stricter admission to vote by adding restrictions in an effort to change key parts of the original law. The restrictions allowed for some states to limit the number of documents measured valid to classify a genuine voter. Other states made it so that there would be a reduction in early voting which impact people that do so. Representative John Lewis proposed the Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2015 a bill which would permit the attorney general additional authority to have more federal eyewitnesses at the polls and check which states requires federal authorization to change voting laws through the means of latest geographic values. “It is a bill for the next generation, and helps protect the legacy of the previous generation who fought so hard five decades ago for these voting rights protections (Senator Patrick Leahy, D-Vt).” The problem with that though is that even though it sounds really good, one big factor in the changes that want to be made is that it would allow it to be easier to a degree for election fraud because restrictions are needed to help lower it. Not that election fraud doesn’t already happen but getting rid of these restrictions allow the chance to more easily be able to do so, as it is there really isn’t any widespread discrimination in effect in terms of how the act is now but it does impact people I’m sure because of said

One of the first changes in voting rights began with issuing literacy tests to limited individuals in hopes to earn a chance to vote. Specifically, the 1965 Alabama Literacy Test was given to African Americans before they were declared eligible to vote. This practice was intended to keep African Americans from having any input when it came to voting. The idea of this literacy test was to give African Americans the chance to earn the right to vote but, would not guarantee that right. The 1965 Alabama Literacy Test was part of voter discrimination by only requiring a certain group of individuals participate in taking it. The 1965 Alabama Literacy Test was intended to be challenging to