4 ms·

TIL voting right depends on literacy in America. Illiterate people have more rights in third world countries apparently.

baumy 2y ago
No, this is incorrect. This has not been the case for 60 years now. These tests were discontinued as part of the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1964. That information is in the linked article, which is short and only takes a minute to read. This example was also far from universal, certainly across the entire USA but even in Louisiana. edit: reading other comments, it isn't clear whether this information is even true for a small subset of Louisiana 60+ years ago
- esalman 2y ago
  TIL yet another way MLK changed America.
  - pjc50 2y ago
    The US talks up its history of freedom, but wasn't really a fully democratic country until the moon landings.
    - refurb 2y ago
      And by that definition much of Europe isn’t fully democratic?
      - pjc50 2y ago
        Most of Europe never had the level of formal, legal racism of the US. But it is worth remembering which European countries were dictatorships at around the same time (Spain, Portugal, Greece) and that Eastern Europe came to democracy even more recently.
      - cto_of_antifa 2y ago
        [dead]
    - trimethylpurine 2y ago
      The South was historically dependent on slavery and rebelled against the freedoms that the North always provided. The North won the war and only after that is there a country in the South to look down on. But the North, and the birth of the nation, was always about freedom. It just took a long time to get the South to come along.
    - throw16180339 2y ago
      I'd personally move the date forward quite a bit. There are some fairly basic freedoms that were lacking up until recently. Spousal rape started to be criminalized in the 1970s, but it took until 1993 for it to be criminalized in every state (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marital_rape_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marital_rape_in_the_United_Sta...). Oklahoma and South Carolina were the two holdouts. It's still treated differently under the law in many states. The Supreme Court struck down sodomy laws in 2003. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas) Same sex couples couldn't marry in every state until 2015. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obergefell_v._Hodges https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obergefell_v._Hodges) Some counties in the usual states ignored the ruling for years. There are still some significant gaps in federal protection. Gender identity and sexual orientation are protected in the workplace and for housing, but not elsewhere.
MandieD 2y ago
Voting rights in parts of America before the Voting Rights Act depended on passing an arbitrary test that differed from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and may or may not have measured literacy and civics knowledge… if you were black (or native American, depending on state). You could be a well-regarded English literature professor at a black college and still have to subject yourself to what you knew was a farce being administered by someone far less literate than you in order to attempt to vote. If you were white (“your grandfather could vote”), you were usually exempt, even if you could barely sign your name on your voter registration.

baumy 2y ago

No, this is incorrect. This has not been the case for 60 years now. These tests were discontinued as part of the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1964. That information is in the linked article, which is short and only takes a minute to read. This example was also far from universal, certainly across the entire USA but even in Louisiana. edit: reading other comments, it isn't clear whether this information is even true for a small subset of Louisiana 60+ years ago

esalman 2y ago
TIL yet another way MLK changed America.
- pjc50 2y ago
  The US talks up its history of freedom, but wasn't really a fully democratic country until the moon landings.
  - refurb 2y ago
    And by that definition much of Europe isn’t fully democratic?
    - pjc50 2y ago
      Most of Europe never had the level of formal, legal racism of the US. But it is worth remembering which European countries were dictatorships at around the same time (Spain, Portugal, Greece) and that Eastern Europe came to democracy even more recently.
    - cto_of_antifa 2y ago
      [dead]
  - trimethylpurine 2y ago
    The South was historically dependent on slavery and rebelled against the freedoms that the North always provided. The North won the war and only after that is there a country in the South to look down on. But the North, and the birth of the nation, was always about freedom. It just took a long time to get the South to come along.
  - throw16180339 2y ago
    I'd personally move the date forward quite a bit. There are some fairly basic freedoms that were lacking up until recently. Spousal rape started to be criminalized in the 1970s, but it took until 1993 for it to be criminalized in every state (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marital_rape_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marital_rape_in_the_United_Sta...). Oklahoma and South Carolina were the two holdouts. It's still treated differently under the law in many states. The Supreme Court struck down sodomy laws in 2003. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas) Same sex couples couldn't marry in every state until 2015. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obergefell_v._Hodges https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obergefell_v._Hodges) Some counties in the usual states ignored the ruling for years. There are still some significant gaps in federal protection. Gender identity and sexual orientation are protected in the workplace and for housing, but not elsewhere.

MandieD 2y ago

Voting rights in parts of America before the Voting Rights Act depended on passing an arbitrary test that differed from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and may or may not have measured literacy and civics knowledge… if you were black (or native American, depending on state). You could be a well-regarded English literature professor at a black college and still have to subject yourself to what you knew was a farce being administered by someone far less literate than you in order to attempt to vote. If you were white (“your grandfather could vote”), you were usually exempt, even if you could barely sign your name on your voter registration.