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Voting Rights Movement Research Paper

491 Words2 Pages

Despite the fact that African Americans and other racial and ethnic minority Americans are guaranteed the right to vote by the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which was passed just after the Civil War in 1870, states and local municipalities continued to use tactics such as poll taxes, literacy tests and outright intimidation to stop people from casting free and unfettered ballots.

During the Civil Rights activism of the 1960's, just 5 days after Martin Luther King, Jr. led the march on Selma, President Lyndon Johnson announced his intention to pass a federal Voting Rights Act to insure that no federal, state or local government may in any way impede people from registering to vote or voting because of their race or ethnicity. In 1965, President Johnson signed the Voting Rights …show more content…

They were set to expire in August 2007, but were extended for another 25 years with the July 2007 reauthorization vote.

There were 3 enforcement-related provisions of the Voting Rights Act that would have expired in August 2007 unless reauthorized. The first is Section 5, which requires certain jurisdictions to obtain approval or "preclearance" from the US Department of Justice or the US District Court in D.C. before they can make any changes to voting practices or procedures. Federal approval will be given only after the jurisdiction proves that the proposed change does not, have the purpose or effect of denying or abridging the right to vote on account of race or color.

Secondly is Section 203, which requires certain jurisdictions to provide bilingual language assistance to voters in communities where there is a concentration of citizens who are limited English proficient. This provision was added to the Voting Rights Act in

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