Amendments: Explanation of Answers Women: 19th Amendment, ratified in 1920. Previously, some states had permitted women to vote, but this amendment extended the right to all American women. 18-year-olds: 26th Amendment, ratified in 1971. In 1970, Congress extended the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the legislation that removed literacy tests and other discriminatory practices used to prevent blacks from voting. In doing so, Congress included a provision lowering the qualifying age for voting from 21 to 18 in all national, state and local elections. Many states challenged this provision, arguing that it was unconstitutional for the federal government to establish voting qualifications for state and local elections. In Oregon v. Mitchell, 400 U.S. 112 (1970), the Supreme Court decided this constitutional issue. The Court held that Congress was empowered to lower the voting age for federal elections-thanks to the “Necessary and Proper” Clause of the Constitution, as well as several other provisions-but had exceeded its power by applying the lower age to state and local elections. To comply with this decision, substantial sums of money would need to be expended to create separate election systems, one federal and one for all others, and to maintain different registration records. States farsightedly decided that such a system would be too confusing, impractical and expensive to run. Thus, the Twenty-Sixth Amendment was proposed and approved by Congress in March 1971, and ratification completed barely four months later. Residents of the District of Columbia: 23rd Amendment, ratified in 1961. The amendment permits residents of the District to vote for the president and vice-president—but does not give the District members of Congress or the Senate with full voting rights. Previously enslaved persons: 15th Amendment, ratified in 1870. The Fifteenth Amendment was part of a natural progression in the amendments following on the heels of the Civil War. The Thirteenth Amendment outlawed slavery; the Fourteenth Amendment granted citizenship to all people born or naturalized in the United States. The Fifteenth Amendment—which states, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude,”—was designed to further protect the rights of the newly freed slaves by eliminating barriers to their voting. In practice, however, many blacks in the South were not enfranchised by this amendment. In the years following the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment, Southern states passed laws that in effect nullified the federal law. Some of these states required citizens to pay a fee, known as a poll tax, before being allowed to vote. In addition, grandfather clauses—limiting the voting right of blacks to those whose fathers or grandfathers voted before the Civil War—were added to the constitutions of several Southern states. Other barriers included “white primaries” and discriminatory literacy tests. Resources The Law Day 2000 Online Conversation has more information about voting and voter registration. Quizzes Home | Back to Amendments Quiz