Voting+Rights+Act

Voting Rights Act Carrie Martin

During the Civil Rights Movement, although slavery had been outlawed long ago, racial tensions still remained. One of the largest dilemmas of the time was the right to vote. Much of the population of America believed that African Americans shouldn't vote. This difference in opinion between the White Americans and the Black Americans caused many problems. Peaceful marches to demand the African American's rights to vote soon became disasterous. During one such riot, the violence was so severe that the day was marked as "Bloody Sunday", on March 7, 1965. Marchers were protesting peacefully in Selma, Alabama, when state troopers made an unprovoked attack, and a large amount of the protesters were wounded, or worse. The 1957 and 1964 acts made small efforts to help Civil Rights, but they were not quite as effective as they needed to be. While African Americans had the right to vote, it became increasingly harder to register without the support of the government to create certain laws prohibiting measures taken to discriminate against Black voting. In Tuskagee, Alabama, the government attempted to remove as many Black voters as it was possible to do. The Supreme Court soon ruled that the state had violated the 15th amendment. The voting rights act was the last major racial protest of the 1960's to recieve a large amount of support from the White population. The Black community, as well as a percentage of the White community, worked towards providing equal rights, or more specifically equal voting rights, to all citizens in the United States. However many of the states, and especially the states in the deep south, resented the equal treatment ideas, and attempted to prevent the African Americans from recieving the same voting privelages. As well as this, many of the White citizens felt this treatment was not reasonable, and endangered the African Americans. The police force also often treated the Black community with violence; riots broke out many times, and the number of wounded and dead Americans increased. On August 6th, 1965, President Johnson passed the Voting Rights legislation. Although it caused mainly positive feedback and was considered an enormous gain for the United States, many citizens remained resentful of the rapidly growing rights of the African American community. Because of the relationship between the Federal and State government in America, the act was challenged in various courts for five years following the signing of the Voting Rights Act. Yet despite all this, the voting act achieved what it had intended to do; it oulawed liiteracy tests as a prerequisite to registering, as well as voting practices which were considered discriminatory. By the end of 1965, one fourth of a million new African American voters were registered. The Voting Rights Act was later revised in 1970, 1975, and 1982. The short term goals of the African Americans striving to reach equality were achieved; registration to vote becamemedia type="googlemap" key="http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Selma,+Alabama&sll=36.879621,-95.712891&sspn=21.934871,63.017578&ie=UTF8&ll=36.527295,-84.858398&spn=11.585334,31.508789&z=5&iwloc=A&output=embed" width="425" height="350"open and safe to every citizen, and the state government could no longer create tests in order to allow for registration. In the long run, the minorities of the United States slowly gained more equal rights, and the votes of every United States citizen was legal and counted regardless of things such as literacy. The Civil Rights Movement was an era which strived towards equal rights for every American, despite heritage and color of skin. Although African Americas were allowed to register to vote, their success was limited due to the lack of strict rules prohibiting discrimination. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 helped to overcome the discriminitory unjustices of voting.This gained more rights to the African American community, and, on the whole, to the Civil Rights Movement, who constantly pushed for a country with equal rights. Both the white and African American citizens who were for equal voting rights influenced the Civil Rights Movement; they were able to overcome their struggles and help to create more fair conditions for the entire United States. The opposing side, who pushed against equal treatment, developed and carried out themedia type="googlespreadsheet" key="p848uRs-N-x2dP_fVRXMBRQ" width="500" height="300"negative ideas and created the wall which the Civil Rights Movement worked to scale. Each side gave life to the Civil Rights Movement, although they had different motives. The Voting Rights Act was a product of the Civil Rights Movement, and without this important piece of legislation, much of the community would not have equal rights to be able to vote freely. The Voting Rights Act was a huge step in African American history, and proved that the Civil Rights Movement was affecting the United States and causing change to come finally to the country.