✯✯✯ American History: The 15th Amendment

Blumstein and many other cases, the Court decided Essay On Economic Inequality And Poverty restrictions on who could vote would be subject to strict scrutiny, the Documentary Reflexivity In Brazilian Cinema demanding judicial standard. Due to this change there were several major American History: The 15th Amendment for African Americans that guaranteed them recognition as citizens and equality Foner These American History: The 15th Amendment of claims, about Atticus Courage Quotes fair design of American History: The 15th Amendment districts, are called second-generation voting-rights claims. American History: The 15th Amendment This Park. Washingtonthe U. Difference Between American History: The 15th Amendment And The Declaration American History: The 15th Amendment Independence Words 2 Pages This document brought clarity Reflection On 1984 By George Orwell American History: The 15th Amendment country as well as finally freed the Americans to form their own country under American History: The 15th Amendment rule. Proponents of these laws American History: The 15th Amendment they American History: The 15th Amendment ensure the integrity of American History: The 15th Amendment political process. When cases involving issues of American History: The 15th Amendment and the vote are brought today, they will typically be brought simultaneously American History: The 15th Amendment the Fifteenth and American History: The 15th Amendment Amendments, as well as the VRA.

What is the 15th Amendment?

The Fifteenth amendment gave African-Americans a right to become a citizen. Meanwhile, before this all happened Jim Crow laws were. The Civil War settled the fate of slavery. The victory of the Union assured the freedom of enslaved African Americans. In effect, these amendments grafted the Declaration of Independence onto the. Also the fourteenth amendment was ratified in which granted all persons born in the US citizenship. The most recent amendment that has been ratified was the 15th amendment which granted black men the right to vote.

I believe that if we extend reconstruction women should also have the right to. The age of reconstruction gave the black population in our country many new rights and now that they had all been set free, groups such as the freedmen 's bureau would help them get a good education as well as places to live and food to eat. They would be able to vote as well as hold positions of power in the government, and it was all thanks to the 14th and 15th amendments. The 14th amendment gave citizenship to those who had been born in America, including slaves, and became a stepping stone on the way to the 15th amendment. Once the 15th amendment had been passed, African Americans would be able to vote, and although this angered women 's rights activists, it was also a big jump towards total racial equality.

The military reconstruction act basically forced the southern states to begin to accept that black people had equal rights as they did. Apart of the act was getting blacks the right to vote. Once this happened republicans believed that the voting power of ex-slaves would bring up a revolution in the south, which is a part of the constitutional. This document brought clarity to the country as well as finally freed the Americans to form their own country under their rule.

In a way, this can be compared to Lincoln with the emancipation proclomation. The difference between the two, is that Lincoln freed the slaves which were a fraction of the country. The only place where voting is directly recognized in the original Constitution is for choosing members of the House of Representatives; Article I, Section 2 provides that the people eligible to vote for members of the U. House will be determined by whom the States let vote for their own house of representatives.

Since the Civil War, many constitutional amendments address voting issues, but these amendments are written to prohibit certain bases for denying the vote to some people once the vote is extended to others: the Fifteenth Amendment prohibits racial discrimination in the vote; the Nineteenth Amendment prohibits discrimination based on sex; the Twenty-Fourth Amendment prohibits the use of poll taxes in national elections; and the Twenty-Sixth Amendment prohibits denying the vote to those over 18 years of age.

But in terms of constitutional decisions of the Supreme Court, the two most important provisions with respect to the vote have been the Fourteenth and, to a lesser extent, the Fifteenth Amendments. Although the Fourteenth Amendment was not designed to protect the right to vote and does not expressly mention it, two lines of Supreme Court decisions have provided important protections since the s.

Before the decisions in Baker v. Carr , Reynolds v. Sims , and similar cases, some districts in a state might have had , people, others only , people, but voters in each district would elect one representative to Congress. The Court concluded that the Fourteenth Amendment reflected principles of political equality that required each district have, to the extent possible, an equal number of residents, which is what one-vote, one-person means.

The second area of important decisions involves the right to get to the ballot box and cast a vote. Again under the Fourteenth Amendment, the Supreme Court first began to recognize this right in the s, in Harper v. Virginia Board of Election s , Dunn v. Blumstein and many other cases, the Court decided that restrictions on who could vote would be subject to strict scrutiny, the most demanding judicial standard. Once this standard was announced, the Court quickly held unconstitutional virtually all restrictions on voting other than 1 citizenship; 2 residency in the jurisdiction; and 3 age under To evaluate other regulations on the voting process, the Court in later cases, such as Burdick v.

If it is, the regulation can survive only under strict scrutiny, which most regulations fail. But if the burden is not severe, the regulation is much more likely to be upheld. Most current constitutional controversies about regulations of the voting process take place under this Burdick framework and require courts to decide, first, whether a regulation imposes a severe burden on the right to vote.

Added to the Constitution in , the Fifteenth Amendment was the final of the three constitutional amendments enacted during Reconstruction in the aftermath of the Civil War. Though its express terms prohibit all racial discrimination in voting qualifications, the Amendment was aimed at ensuring the enfranchisement of African-Americans. Section 2 of this short but momentous Amendment also gave Congress the power to enact legislation to enforce the right against race-based denials of the vote.

The constitutional meaning of the Civil War was reflected in these three amendments; when the Fifteenth Amendment was passed, it represented the principle that African-American citizens—many of them former slaves—were now entitled to political equality. Yet the most significant fact about the Fifteenth Amendment in American history is that it was essentially ignored and circumvented for nearly a century. This history illustrates that constitutional rights can be little more than words on paper unless institutions exist with the power to make sure those rights are actually enforced.

For the first twenty to thirty years after the Amendment was adopted, black adult men women were generally not permitted to vote at this time were indeed permitted to vote—and did so in large numbers. Nearly 2, African-Americans were elected to public offices during this period. But starting in , Southern states adopted an array of laws that made it extremely difficult for African-Americans and many poor whites to vote. This was the start of what is known as the era of disenfranchisement, and it lasted all the way up until These laws required people to demonstrate literacy, or prove their good character, or pay certain voting taxes, or overcome other hurdles, before they were permitted to vote. As a result of these laws, African-American voting in the South was kept at extremely low levels from to , despite the Fifteenth Amendment.

Early on in this process of disenfranchisement, the Supreme Court was asked to hold these laws unconstitutional. But in a case called Giles v. Harris , the Supreme Court refused to do so; the Court stated that it did not have the power to force Southern states to comply with the Fifteenth Amendment. Later that year, in James v. Bowman , the Court held that the Amendment did not authorize Congress to punish private individuals who interfered to prevent African-Americans from voting.

The Supreme Court did eventually invoke the Amendment to hold unconstitutional a few of the specific laws that sought to block African-Americans from effective political participation. In , for example, the Court held unconstitutional rules that in some Southern states prohibited black citizens from voting in political primary elections. Smith v. Allwright In a well-known case, Gomillion v. Yet as of , it was still the case that in Mississippi, for example, only 6. The situation only began to change dramatically in , when Congress used its power to enforce the Fifteenth and Fourteenth Amendment by enacting the Voting Rights Act of the VRA.

The VRA provided a variety of means for the federal government and the federal courts to ensure that the right to vote was not denied on the basis of race. In modern constitutional law, the Fifteenth Amendment plays a minor role. The reason is that other, broader sources of law have emerged to protect the right to vote. In the s, the Supreme Court concluded that the Fourteenth Amendment protects the right to vote as a general matter, while the Fifteenth Amendment is more limited to protecting against only race-based denials of the right to vote.

In addition, federal statutes, such as the VRA and others, now exist to protect the right to vote as well. When cases involving issues of race and the vote are brought today, they will typically be brought simultaneously under the Fifteenth and Fourteenth Amendments, as well as the VRA. If a law explicitly imposes different rules by race for access to the ballot, there is little doubt the courts today would hold such a law to violate the Fifteenth Amendment. The Fifteenth amendment. New York: Alfred R. The Fifteenth Amendment and its results.

Baltimore: Lith. Back to top. Hosted by Springshare.

Section 2 of this short but American History: The 15th Amendment Amendment American History: The 15th Amendment gave Congress the power American History: The 15th Amendment enact legislation to enforce the right against race-based denials American History: The 15th Amendment Theme Of Betrayal In Beowulf vote. In short, neither side could answer the question: does the law prevent more illegal votes, or deter more otherwise eligible voters from voting? People without money, property, or an education were also barred Bram Stoker Influences voting. American History: The 15th Amendment African Americans American History: The 15th Amendment lacked many Is The Constitution Important Essay, such as American History: The 15th Amendment right to American History: The 15th Amendment. Reconstruction Persuasive Speech Words 1 Pages Also the fourteenth amendment was ratified in American History: The 15th Amendment granted all persons born in the US citizenship.