Deconstructing the History of Voter Suppression
“Would you really want people like the Boston Bomber casting their ballot in an election?”
In conversations about felony disenfranchisement, or the withdrawal of voting rights from convicted felons, rhetorical questions like these are often used to justify why criminals should not be allowed to retain their right to vote. However, felony disenfranchisement does not equally impact all Americans. The concept itself is largely rooted in and disguised by America’s racially discriminatory past.
The year 1870 marked a pivotal turning point for Black people in America. The passage of the 15th Amendment meant that African American men could now vote in elections. However, the Black community still struggled to achieve the same level of equality as their white counterparts at the polls. States actively sought for legal loopholes to prevent Black people from casting a ballot. Difficult literacy tests, inaccessible polling locations, and the Grandfather Clause were just a few of the obstacles that made it nearly impossible for African Americans to exercise their right to vote.
Although the Voting Rights Act of 1965 outlawed these malicious practices, institutionalized discrimination did not end there. Race-based voter suppression merely rebranded itself through the criminal justice system. Felony disenfranchisement thus became the newest loophole for preventing Black Americans from reaching the polls. By making it legal to strip convicted felons of their voting rights, it became increasingly easier for local law enforcement to find reasons to make arrests.
In a society where Black people were already alienated and stigmatized, it didn’t take much more than their very existence for them to be the primary targets of what was the beginning of a mass incarceration epidemic.
While Black Americans only make up 12 percent of the U.S population, they represent roughly 33 percent of the state and federal prison population. As a result, today, Black Americans are more than four times as likely to lose their voting rights than the rest of the American population. The racial discrimination that permeates through the American criminal justice system has not only put the United States as the leading country for incarceration rates, but has stripped millions of Black Americans of an important civil right that aligns with a true democracy. This is what ignites an urgent call for restoration of voting rights for convicted felons.
Today, restoration of voting rights is only achievable in certain U.S states. In eleven states, felons lose their voting rights indefinitely, and in nineteen states, felons lose their voting rights for a period of time after serving their sentence. It is also no coincidence that the rigidity of these laws often coincides with the socio-demographic make-up of regions in the United States. A study conducted by Northwestern University found that regions with higher concentrations of Black Americans passed more stringent laws that permanently deny people convicted of a crime the right to vote.
Exercising one’s right to vote is a critical element of a true democracy.
For too long this right was stripped from the African American community, and we can observe widespread felony disenfranchisement as a byproduct of this continued marginalization. So the next time you ask if the Boston bomber should be allowed to retain their voting rights, ask yourself if it is people who look like him that are targeted most by the criminal justice system.
Written by Jade Harris
