Voting Rights Act

Examples of Voting Rights Act in the following topics:

• The Civil Rights Acts

  • The Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed forms of discrimination against women and minorities.
  • The Civil Rights Act was followed by the Voting Rights Act, signed into law by President Johnson in 1965.
  • The Voting Rights Act outlawed discriminatory voting practices that had been responsible for the widespread disenfranchisement of African-Americans.
  • The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of national legislation in the United States that prohibits discrimination in voting.
  • Compare and contrast the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act

• Civil Rights and Voting Rights

  • The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were landmark pieces of legislation that addressed major forms of discrimination.
  • The bill would soon be followed by the equally momentous Voting Rights Act, which effectively ended the disenfranchisement of blacks in the South.
  • Kennedy called for a civil rights act in his speech about civil rights on June 11, 1963.
  • His proposal, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, prohibited states and local governments from passing laws that discriminated against voters on the basis of race.
  • The Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act changed the lives of African Americans and transformed society in many ways.

• The 26th Amendment

  • The Twenty-sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution barred the states or federal government from setting a voting age higher than eighteen.
  • The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.
  • On June 22, 1970, President Richard Nixon signed an extension of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that required the voting age to be 18 in all federal, state, and local elections.

• Legislative Change

  • The Civil Rights Act of 1957, primarily a voting rights bill, was the first civil rights legislation enacted by Congress in the United States since the Reconstruction Era following the American Civil War.
  • The goal of the 1957 Civil Rights Act was to ensure that all Americans could exercise their right to vote.
  • The Civil Rights Act of 1960 addressed some of the shortcomings of the 1957 act.
  • Designed to enforce the voting rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, the Act secured voting rights for racial minorities throughout the country, especially in the South.
  • Analyze the gains and limitations of the Civil Rights Acts of 1957, 1960, and 1964, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

• Latinos

  • On average, Latino citizens continue to vote at significantly lower rates than non-Latino white voters.
  • Others examine the question of the rationality of voting: does voting serve the self-interest of any given individual, and what are the interests or issues that might change someone's voting patterns?
  • As such, people may live for many years in the US without being able to vote.
  • These groups are advocating for resources, supports and rights.
  • One important institutional change aimed at lowering the cost for Latino voter participation is the Language Minority Provision of the Voting Rights Act, first introduced in 1975, and then amended in 1992 and 2006.

• African Americans

  • While the fifteenth amendment provided legal protection for voting rights based on race, during the Jim Crow era, politicians created new institutions to suppress the vote of Black residents.
  • The African-American Civil Rights Movement encompasses social movements in the United States whose goal was to end racial segregation and discrimination against black Americans and enforce constitutional voting rights to them.
  • In 1964, the Civil Rights Act was passed.
  • In 1965, the Voting Rights Act established federal oversight of election regulations, and banned voter qualifications or prerequisites that limited the right to vote on account of race or color.
  • This act removed a large institutional barrier to voting and helped to further protect voting rights.

• Additional Factors: Gender, Age, Religion, Race, and Ethnicity

  • Certain factors like age, gender, race, and religion help describe why people vote and who is more likely to vote.
  • This rise in youth vote is partly a result of voter registration and mobilization efforts by groups like Rock the Vote.
  • Discriminatory practices kept the turnout rate of African-Americans low until after the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
  • Eventually, civil rights protests and litigation eliminated many barriers to voting.
  • About 15% of the electorate in the United States supports the Christian right.

• Factors Affecting Voter Turnout

  • For example, in the southern United States before and during the civil rights movement, white southerners used many methods to prevent minorities from voting.
  • On the other hand, if low turnout is a reflection of contentment of voters about likely winners or parties, then low turnout is as legitimate as high turnout, as long as the right to vote exists.
  • Similarly, voter suppression is a strategy to influence the outcome of an election by discouraging or preventing people from exercising their right to vote .
  • For example, in the southern United States before and during the civil rights movement, white southerners used many methods to prevent minorities from voting.
  • The Civil Rights Act of 1964 put a stop to literacy tests and any other methods of preventing people from voting.

• The 15th Amendment

  • The Fifteenth Amendment prohibits states from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen's race.
  • There was an impressive surge in political participation after the Civil War, due largely to the Reconstruction acts.
  • The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
  • The Fifteenth Amendment prohibits each government in the United States from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen's "race, color, or previous condition of servitude" (for example, slavery).

• Voting as Political Participation

  • Voting is the most quintessential form of political participation, although many eligible voters do not vote in elections.
  • A unique and special political act, voting allows for more people's views to be represented than any other activity.
  • Expanded voter registration means that more and more people have been able to participate, and voter turnout trends indicate how many people exercise their right to vote as a primary means of political participation.
  • In 1993, Congress passed the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, also known as the "motor voter" law, allowing citizens to register at motor vehicle and social service offices.
  • Still, many people do not vote regularly.