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The beginning of voting
Generally, states limited the right to vote to property-owning or tax-paying white males (about 6% of the population) -
The Naturalization Act
The original United States Naturalization Law of March 26, 1790 (1 Stat. 103) provided the first rules to be followed by the United States in the granting of national citizenship. This law limited naturalization to immigrants who were free White persons of good character. It thus excluded Native Americans, indentured servants, slaves, free blacks and later Asians, although free blacks were allowed citizenship at the state level in certain states. -
White men with no property
The first presidential election in which non-property-holding white males could vote in the vast majority of states. -
Most white men can vote
Of the new west, nine became states. These news states where new and forward in their thinking, extending the right to vote to all white males over the age of 21. This was a new and un-heard of expansion. Kentucky was the first state that extended the right to vote to all white males in the state. -
Male rights based on race
After the Civil War, the 15th Amendment prohibited states from denying a male citizen the right to vote based on “race, color or previous condition of servitude.” Nevertheless, in the ensuing decades, various discriminatory practices were used to prevent African Americans, particularly those in the South, from exercising their right to vote. -
Native Americans are allowed to vote
Citizenship is granted to Native Americans who are willing to disassociate themselves from their tribe by the Dawes Act, making them technically eligible to vote. -
Women's suffrage
The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted American women the right to vote, a right known as women's suffrage. It was ratified on August 18, 1920, ending almost a century of protest. -
Protest for rights
Peaceful participants in a Selma to Montgomery march for voting rights were met by Alabama state troopers who attacked them with nightsticks, tear gas and whips after they refused to turn back. -
The Voting rights Act
After the Us Senate and the House of representatives passed the law, Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law with Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders present at the ceremony. -
Adults get the right
Adults aged 18 through 21 are granted the right to vote by the Twenty-sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution. This was enacted in response to Vietnam War protests, which argued that soldiers who were old enough to fight for their country should be granted the right to vote.