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Voting Limited to White Male Property Owners
Voting rights vary among the colonies, but leaders
agree that only individuals who have a “stake
in society” should be allowed to vote, meaning
white male property owners and taxpayers. -
First Women’s Suffrage Conference
About 300 activists gather for a convention
in Seneca Falls, N.Y., to strategize on
women’s suffrage. Elizabeth Cady Stanton
and Lucretia Mott, along with 60 other
women and 32 men, sign the Declaration
of Sentiments and Resolutions, modeled
on the Declaration of Independence,
which calls for equal treatment of women
and men under the law and voting rights
for women. -
Former Slaves Get Voting Right
The 15th Amendment is ratified, prohibiting
federal and state governments from denying
citizens the right to vote based on “race, color,
or previous condition of servitude,” but it does
not specifically mention women. About 150
women attempt to vote after ratification but are
turned away. -
Poll Taxes and Literacy Tests
Mostly Southern states begin to charge a
fee, known as a poll tax, and institute literacy
tests to keep African Americans, who
are mostly poor, from voting. (Connecticut
in 1855 adopted the first literacy test to discourage
Irish-Catholic immigrants from voting.)
Because the tests also exclude many
white voters, states add grandfather clauses
to allow those who could vote before 1870
and their descendants to vote regardless of
literacy tests. -
Women Win Right to Vote
Seventy-two years after the Seneca Falls Convention
first called for women’s voting rights, the 19th
Amendment is ratified. Only one person who had
signed the convention’s Declaration of Sentiments
and Resolutions, Charlotte Woodward, is still
alive and able to exercise her right to vote. -
Civil Rights Act Is Passed
The Civil Rights Act is the first civil rights
law enacted since Reconstruction. It creates
the Commission on Civil Rights to investigate
voting rights complaints and authorizes the Justice
Department to take legal action, but it has
a slow start. Sen. Strom Thurmond sustains a
one-man filibuster for 24 hours and 18 minutes
to try to stop the bill. -
Voting Rights Act
Racial violence in the South prompts
President Lyndon Johnson to call
for a strong national voting rights
law that directly addresses voting
discrimination because states
are resistant to enforcing the 15th
Amendment, passing new discriminatory
practices when others are
struck down. The law bans literacy
tests and sends federal examiners to
Southern states to register African
American voters. . -
King Leads Voting Rights Marches
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. launches a
voter registration drive in Selma, Ala.,
where the voting rolls are 99 percent
white and 1 percent African American,
even though African Americans
outnumber whites. Over nearly two
months, 2,000 are arrested as they try
to register. No African Americans are
added to the rolls. After an African
American youth is murdered, King tries
to lead marchers from Selma to Montgomery
but is met with brutal violence. -
Voting Age Lowered to 18
The 26th Amendment permanently
lowers the voting
age for all elections
to age 18. The change
was largely in response to
the Vietnam War and the
feeling that young people
who are old enough to die
for their country are old
enough to vote.
