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only white men with property/land allowed to vote
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last religious voting pre-requisite is eliminated
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Property ownership and tax requirements eliminated by 1850. Almost all adult white males could vote.
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Connecticut adopts the nation's first literacy test for voting, other states follow suit
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The 15th Amendment is passed. It gives former slaves the right to vote and protects the voting rights of adult male citizens of any race.
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Mississippi adopts a literacy test to keep African Americans from voting.
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The 17th Amendment calls for members of the U.S. Senate to be elected directly by the people instead of State Legislatures.
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Oklahoma was the last state to append a grandfather clause to its literacy requirement (1910). In Guinn v. United States the Supreme Court rules that the clause is in conflict with the 15th Amendment, thereby outlawing literacy tests for federal elections.
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The 19th Amendment guarantees women's suffrage.
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The 24th Amendment bans the poll tax as a requirement for voting in federal elections.
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The Voting Rights Act protects the rights of minority voters and eliminates voting barriers such as the literacy test. The Act is expanded and renewed in 1970, 1975, and 1982.
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lowers voting age from 21 to 18
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The Federal "Motor Voter Law" takes effect, making it easier to register to vote.
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all voting machines replaced with the touch screen machines
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texas and other states pass voter id laws to vote
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A federal appeals panel ruled in August that Texas's voter ID law, which was passed in 2011, discriminates against blacks and Hispanics and violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The panel ordered a lower court to re-evaluate if the law was in fact written with discriminatory intent and to fix it if it was passed under such circumstances.
