Elimination of Black Voting
Following the abolition of slavery in 1862, many changes were made for African American citizens. The end of the war in 1865 marked one of the largest changes made to history with the passing of the Fourteenth Amendment, giving full civil rights to citizens of all colors, and that of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870, which gave citizens their right to vote despite their race. This, however, was something white southerners were not used to and refused to become accustomed to. Many southern states chose to ignore these Amendments. By banding together, white southerners used violence and deceit in order to keep African Americans from their voting rights. Between 1890 and 1906, every southern state created laws or constitutional provisions in order to eliminate the black vote [7].
Literacy TestsAnother popular device of eliminating the black vote was through literacy tests. In order to cast their ballot, prospective voters were required to demonstrate a level of proficiency. In some cases, the test was 20 pages long for blacks, and those administering the rests were white Democrats who nearly always ruled that blacks were illiterate [6]. Test questions were significantly hard and typically required the test taker to have an above average education in order to even pass the test.
The literacy tests
were specifically made with the intent for African Americans to be unable to
vote, even coming to the point that southern Democrats would band together with
the Ku Klux Klan in order to burn down schools attended by blacks in order to
prevent further education.
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Poll TaxDespite the passing of the Fifteenth Amendment, southern Democrats found ways in order to get around the voting protections of the Amendments by creating ways to prevent African Americans from voting. One of the more popular devices was the poll tax in which each citizen had to pay a fee before voting. The fee to vote was steep enough that most poor were unable to pay the tax and therefore unable to vote, which also included poor whites but was disproportionately harsher on blacks who had just emerged from slavery and had not yet even established an independent means of living [6].
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Grandfather ClauseSix southern states also adopted a “grandfather clause”, which exempted descendants of those who had been eligible to vote before the Civil War from the new requirements that the southern Democrats had created, such as the poll tax and literacy tests [7]. Since slavery had only been abolished after the Civil War, this ensured that whites that could not pay the poll tax or were not literate could still vote. This is because prior to the passing of the Fifteenth Amendment, voting in southern states was mainly by whites.
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