Fifteenth Amendment

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Fifteenth Amendment

The Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides that voting rights shall not be abridged by the federal government or any state "on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." The amendment reflected the federal government's emergence during Reconstruction as the guarantor of civil rights against state intrusion.

Having granted most southern black men the right to vote, at least temporarily, by the Military Reconstruction

acts of 1867, the Republican majority in Congress wanted to render black suffrage nationwide and permanent. Congressman George S. Boutwell of Massachusetts proposed a constitutional amendment in January 1869. Controversy arose over the wording, with many supporters of civil rights fearing that a vague amendment would permit later disenfranchisement through indirect means.

Other Republicans, however, insisted that northern states be able to restrict suffrage on the basis of literacy and education, often for nativist reasons. In addition, some congressmen feared granting unrestricted authority in this area to the federal government. In response to such concerns, a relatively limited form of the amendment passed Congress in February 1869, over vehement Democratic opposition. It was ratified by the states in March 1870, aided by the presence of Reconstruction governments in most southern states.

A more radical amendment, calling for an end to disenfranchisement based on "race, color, nationality, property, education, or religious beliefs," was rejected, as were feminist calls for women's suffrage. Furthermore, the amendment did not guarantee the right of blacks to hold office.

As proponents of the more radical amendment had feared, southern Democratic state governments did almost eliminate black voting through poll taxes, literacy tests, residency requirements, and similar means. The Fifteenth Amendment, however, did permanently secure voting rights in the northern states, several of which did not permit black voting at the time. The amendment was also of long-term significance in that it declared equal suffrage an ideal, if not a reality, in the nation's fundamental law. The effort to actually secure black suffrage took more than this amendment. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) fought successfully against the many abridgments to black suffrage in the early twentieth century, but it was not until the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that the vast majority of eligible southern blacks were registered to vote.

See also National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP); Voting Rights Act of 1965