Malcolm Rivera
The United States Constitution, which became the official framework of the US government on June 21, 1788, did not initially define who was eligible to vote, leaving it up to individual states to determine voter eligibility. While most states restricted voting rights to white male adult property owners, some states, like New Jersey, allowed free Black men and women of both races to vote, provided they met property or tax requirements. The Fifteenth, Nineteenth, and Twenty-sixth Amendments to the Constitution have since established that voting rights cannot be restricted on the basis of race, sex, or age (18 and older). However, the fight for voting rights has been long and arduous, with Democrats unanimously opposing the Fifteenth Amendment and states adopting new constitutions and laws that made it more difficult for racial minorities and the poor to vote.
| Characteristics | Values |
|---|---|
| Date of ratification | June 21, 1788 |
| Number of states that ratified the Constitution | 9 out of 13 |
| First state to ratify the Constitution | Delaware |
| States that opposed the Constitution | Rhode Island |
| Reasons for opposition | Lack of protection for rights such as freedom of speech, religion, and press |
| Voting rights at the time | Varied across states; some allowed only white male adult property owners, while others allowed men of any race or women to vote if they met property requirements |
| Amendments added after ratification | The Bill of Rights, 14th, 15th, 17th, 19th, and 26th Amendments |
| Voting rights after amendments | Prohibited from being restricted based on race, color, previous condition of servitude, sex, or age (18 and older) |
| States with voting restrictions | Former Confederate states, with provisions like poll taxes, literacy tests, and felony disenfranchisement |
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What You'll Learn
Women and non-white men were disenfranchised
The fight for women's suffrage was a long and difficult one. Women in eight states had won the right to vote before World War I, but support for a federal amendment was tepid. The war provided new urgency to the cause, as women took on visible roles in support of the war effort. In 1917, the National Woman's Party (NWP) began picketing the White House to draw attention to women's suffrage. The 19th Amendment, passed in 1920, finally granted women the right to vote. However, it did not guarantee all women the right to vote. Native Americans, for example, did not gain the right to vote until the Snyder Act of 1924.
The women's suffrage movement experienced tensions and fractures over race, particularly with the introduction of the 15th Amendment. Some suffragists, like Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, opposed the amendment, arguing that black men should not receive the right to vote before white women. This stance was opposed by notable black leaders such as Frederick Douglass, who believed that "right is of no sex, truth is of no colour". Black suffragists played a pivotal role in the passage of the 19th Amendment, but they remained without a practical right to vote following its adoption and were often limited to non-leadership positions in civil and voting rights organizations.
The road to suffrage for women and non-white men was a long and arduous one, marked by protests, agitation, and legislative battles. While the 19th Amendment was a significant milestone, it did not end the struggle for voting rights for marginalized groups in the United States.
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Democrats opposed the Fifteenth Amendment
The Fifteenth Amendment, which was ratified on February 3, 1870, was the last of three amendments enacted during the Reconstruction Era that transformed American politics, government, and society. The amendment grants all male citizens the right to vote, regardless of their race, skin colour, or previous enslavement.
The Fifteenth Amendment was passed by Congress in 1869, and it prohibits the government from denying a person the right to vote based on their race. The amendment was proposed after Ulysses S. Grant was elected president in 1868, which convinced a majority of Republicans that protecting the franchise of black male voters was crucial for the party's future.
However, the Democratic Party in the Southern United States opposed the Fifteenth Amendment. From 1890 to 1910, they adopted new state constitutions and enacted "Jim Crow" laws, which created barriers to voter registration, such as poll taxes and literacy tests. These laws, along with violent intimidation by the Ku Klux Klan, effectively disenfranchised most black voters and many poor whites.
The Supreme Court initially interpreted the Fifteenth Amendment narrowly, which allowed these discriminatory practices to continue. It was not until the 20th century that the Court began to interpret the amendment more broadly and strike down discriminatory laws and restrictions on voting rights.
The struggle to pass the Fifteenth Amendment was intense due to divisions within Congress. Ultimately, the faction that prevailed only sought to prohibit racial qualifications for voting, rather than enacting universal male suffrage or guaranteeing Black suffrage.
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Rhode Island delayed full ratification
The state of Rhode Island was the last of the 13 states to ratify the US Constitution on May 29, 1790. Rhode Island's opposition to the ratification was chiefly due to the paper money issued in Rhode Island pounds since 1786 by the governing Country Party, intended to pay off the state's burdensome Revolutionary War debt. The state legislature also repeatedly rejected calls for a convention to discuss ratification. Instead, on March 1, 1788, the legislature called for a statewide referendum on the Constitution, which was held on March 24, 1788.
Nearly a dozen conventions were called in Rhode Island to ratify the Constitution but failed to do so, often by wide margins. In one instance, 92% of the delegates voted against ratification. A force of 1,000 Country Party supporters descended on Providence on July 4, 1788, to break up celebrations of New Hampshire's ratification, and armed confrontation was averted only after organizers agreed to commemorate only Independence Day.
On May 18, 1790, the United States Senate passed a bill that would ban all trade with Rhode Island if enacted, effectively isolating the diminutive state from the Union. The Rhode Island General Assembly capitulated 11 days later and ratified the Constitution, before the proposed embargo could be acted on by the United States House of Representatives. However, the General Assembly's ratification included a lengthy list of caveats, including a list of proposed amendments to the Constitution that Rhode Island wished to see taken up, such as the abolition of the slave trade.
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States had varying voter eligibility
The US Constitution does not contain an explicit right to vote. However, almost all state constitutions do. The "right to vote" can be understood as prohibiting certain forms of legal discrimination in establishing qualifications for suffrage. States may deny this right for reasons other than those based on "race, color, or previous condition of servitude" as outlined in the Fifteenth Amendment (1870).
State laws and local laws have been used to determine voter eligibility, and these have varied historically. Beginning around 1790, individual states began to move away from property ownership as a qualification for enfranchisement, instead focusing on sex and race. By 1856, white men were allowed to vote in all states, regardless of property ownership. However, several states, including Pennsylvania and New Jersey, stripped free black males of the right to vote during this period. Wyoming granted women the right to vote in 1869, long before this right was achieved nationally.
After the Civil War, Jim Crow laws were used in various parts of the country to suppress Black suffrage. These included literacy tests, poll taxes, and religious tests. From 1890 to 1908, ten out of the eleven former Confederate states ratified new constitutions or amendments that made voter registration more difficult for African Americans. These included requirements such as poll taxes, complicated record-keeping, and literacy tests.
The Supreme Court has played a role in determining voter qualifications. In 1966, the Court ruled in Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections that restricting voting qualifications to citizens who had paid a poll tax constituted invidious discrimination under the Fourteenth Amendment. The 24th Amendment (1964) also eliminated poll taxes. In Marston v. Lewis, the Court upheld a fifty-day durational residency and voter registration requirement, determining that it served the state's interest in accurate voter lists.
Voter ID laws continue to vary between states, with some requiring photo ID and others not requiring any ID.
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The Constitution lacked voting rights
In the early 19th century, some states began to limit the property requirement for voting, but this process unfolded unevenly and was left up to each state. For example, New Jersey revoked the vote from Black men and women in 1807, while Wyoming granted women the right to vote in 1869, long before the 19th Amendment was passed in 1920.
The 14th Amendment, passed after the Civil War, extended citizenship and voting rights to all Americans regardless of race, and guaranteed that states could not restrict these rights. The 15th Amendment, ratified in 1870, explicitly prohibited restricting the right to vote due to race, ethnicity, or prior slave status. However, despite these amendments, the right to vote was interpreted relatively narrowly by the Supreme Court throughout the late 19th and mid-20th centuries.
Discriminatory practices and laws, such as poll taxes, literacy tests, and the activities of the Ku Klux Klan, prevented many African Americans in the Southern states from exercising their constitutional rights. It wasn't until the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that major steps were taken to curtail voter suppression.
Today, while the Constitution does not explicitly state that citizens have a right to vote, it does give Congress and the federal government the power to determine the "Times, Places, and Manner" of congressional elections. This has allowed for the establishment of a single national Election Day and the mandate of single-member congressional districts.
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Frequently asked questions
The Constitution was not ratified by all states until May 29, 1790, when Rhode Island finally approved the document. The first state to ratify the Constitution was Delaware on December 7, 1787, followed by Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, and Connecticut. New Hampshire was the ninth of 13 states to ratify it on June 21, 1788.
The Constitution did not originally define who was eligible to vote, allowing each state to determine who was eligible. While most states restricted voting to property-owning or tax-paying white men, some states, like New Jersey, allowed free Black men and women of both races to vote, provided they met the property or tax requirements. Women were largely prohibited from voting, as were men without property.
In the House of Representatives, 144 Republicans voted to approve the 15th Amendment, with zero Democrats in favor, 39 no votes, and seven abstentions. In the Senate, 33 Republicans voted to approve, again with zero Democrats in favor.
