|
|
 |
 |
|
Winning the Vote: A History of Voting Rights
by Steven Mintz
John and Rebecca Moores Professor of
History, University of Houston |
|
 |
 |
|
| The Fifteenth
Amendment Celebrated, 1870. (GLC02917) |
|
Americans vote less than any other people in Western societies.
Just half of registered voters actually vote in presidential
elections, and many fewer vote in state and local elections.
Today, the only restrictions on voting involve the insane,
convicted felons, and the young. But in the past, women,
paupers, African-Americans, Native Americans, Asian immigrants,
and other groups were denied the right to vote. There
were religious tests, property qualifications, literacy
tests, poll taxes, and exclusions on the grounds of race
and sex.
The story of how voting rights became virtually universal
is not a story of unbroken progress. Rather, it is, as
historian Alexander Keyssar has persuasively argued, a
story of struggle. There have been periods in which voting
rights have contracted and periods in which they have
expanded. The United States was the first nation to expand
the vote to virtually all white men, but it has also undergone
periods in which voting rights were restricted, and it
was one of the last Western nations to guarantee the vote
to all citizens.
Voting Rights on the Eve of the Revolution
The basic principle that governed voting in colonial America
was that voters should have a "stake in society." Leading
colonists associated democracy with disorder and mob rule,
and believed that the vote should be restricted to those
who owned property or paid taxes. Only these people, in
their view, were committed members of the community and
were sufficiently independent to vote. Each of the thirteen
colonies required voters either to own a certain amount
of land or personal property, or to pay a specified amount
in taxes.
Many colonies imposed other restrictions on voting, including religious tests. Catholics were barred from voting in five colonies and Jews in four.
The right to vote varied widely in colonial America. In
frontier areas, seventy to eighty percent of white men
could vote. But in some cities, the percentage was just
forty to fifty percent.
The Impact of the Revolution
The American Revolution was fought in part over the issue
of voting. The Revolutionaries rejected the British argument
that representation in Parliament could be virtual (that
is, that English members of Parliament could adequately
represent the interests of the colonists). Instead, the
Revolutionaries argued that government derived its legitimacy
from the consent of the governed.
This made many restrictions on voting seem to be a violation of fundamental rights. During the period immediately following the Revolution, some states replaced property qualifications with taxpaying requirements. This reflected the principle that there should be "no taxation without representation." Other states allowed anyone who served in the army or militia to vote. Vermont was the first state to eliminate all property and taxpaying qualifications for voting.
By 1790, all states had eliminated religious requirements
for voting. As a result, approximately sixty to seventy
percent of adult white men could vote. During this time,
six states (Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina,
Pennsylvania, and Vermont) permitted free African-Americans
to vote.
|
|
|
|
