Significance of the voting rights act of 1965
President Lyndon b Johnson signed the voting rights act of 1965 into law. The main aim of this act was to prevent the legal obstacles at both the local and state levels. The barriers would have stopped the African Americans from exercising their right to vote as assured by the US constitution under the 15th amendment. In United States history, the voting rights act of 1965 is taken as one of the most extensive elements of the civil rights legislation. Since the signing of this act into law, the world has never been the same again. Eight days after it was signed, the federal voting assessors quickly set out to Selma, Ala. In a single day, they registered 381 more black voters than they had registered in Dallas County over the previous 65 years. Sheriff Jim clerk was determined to fight against black registration as he went further to use physical violence. Ironically, he had played a role in ensuring that the blacks were registered as voters because in March that year, he had steered the charge in the savage ‘blood Sunday’. The day involved hurting and beating people who were matching contesting for voting rights. The event ignited national violence and stimulated demands for more robust federal mediation. The county had recorded eight thousand more black voters by November that year. Also, it was anticipated that after the following years’ primary elections, the county would have another sheriff as well, and Jim Clark would be left trying his hand at selling movable homes.
Even though the consequences of the voting rights of 1965 were not felt immediately, its impact was the same everywhere; a white minority had ever ruled with an iron hand. Now, the justice department could refer assessors to any county or state where a literacy test or the same deterrent to black registration existed as of the presidential elections of 1964. Also, the examiners could be sent to places where registration or the turn out for that election was below 50% of the voting-age population. In the search for federal ‘preclearance‘, such ‘special coverage’ jurisdictions were needed before changing the voting or election procedures. Originally, the above provisions were used in all Deep South states except Florida, Virginia, and forty other counties in North Carolina.
Furthermore, they worked more in Mississippi, where the percentage of qualified and registered black voters raised from 7% to 67% within five years. The reaffirmation of the new measures of the equal rights to vote applied to all states and by 1980, the number of adult black people on the voter rolls in the south had already gone beyond that in the other areas of the nation. Even though three million extra whites than black voters were registered in the southern rolls in the 1960s, the ‘special coverage’ of the Voting Rights Act indicated a combined total of 72 black voted officials in 1965 and the number was boosted to almost 1000 a decade later.
The public offices across the south had more black people by the mid-1980s than the rest of the nation combined. Even though the percentage of black public office holders was still low, by 2001, the gap outside the south was about four times greater than the difference within it. Gavin Wright has revealed that the tangible benefits of the voting acts rights for black people did not end there. He has indicated that a significant presence of black people has resulted in expressive gains in black opportunity, earnings, and employment. The black political empowerment has shown a noticeable increase in the portion of state transfer payment even in underprivileged regions.
Furthermore, black individuals in voted positions could increase private employment. In 1974, Maynard Jackson was elected the first black Mayor in Atlanta. By the time Andrew Young, his predecessor left office in 1990, approximately 1600 contracts had been granted to over 600 firms that belong to the minority. Recently, the supreme court has been tolerating the efforts to mark away the signature political accomplishment of the civil rights movement, most times returning to the same logic, which did away with the original voting guarantees of the fifteenth amendment over a century ago. Nineteen countries had enforced limitations on voting by the 2012 Election Day. The restrictions could lower the minority turnout, including five still subjects to the previous 1965 preclearance condition. The obstacles were brushed off by the court. However, on June 25th 2013, it ruled that the preclearance attack was unnecessary and unconstitutional in Shelby county [ Ala.] V. Holder. The logic behind this was that the voting rights act had worked so well that it was no longer required. Lawmakers in several nations were planning to add voting requirements within a short time. For instance, in North Carolina, Republican legislators went on to cut the early voting period of the state approximately in half, do away with same-day registration, and enforce a more strict identification provision. Currently, the above measures are under scrutiny in a central courtroom in Winston-Salem. NAACP lawyers have called the case ‘our Selma’, and a federal panel has established that one of the texas identification requirements violates the 1965 act.