LBJ - Law Review

The National Voting Act of 1965 was a law that outlawed any discrimination during voting practices. This Act prohibited all states from having any "voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure" that could deny the rights of any citizen to vote on account of color or race. Basically, Congress made the Act intending to stop the practice of making qualified voters pass literacy tests in order to register to vote. The Act made it so that there was federal oversight of elections administrations in each state which made it so that states states with a history of discriminatory voting practices could not make any change that would affect voting without getting approval from the Department of Justice. Congress has made ammendments to and extended the Act many times since it first passed; the most recent being the twenty-five year extension signed by George W. Bush on July 26, 2006.

At the time, I think that this Act was a very good idea. Many states, especially those with a large number of African-Americans, would make registration and the actual voting process different so that it would discriminate against African-Americans and possibly women. The way that some processes would be disriminatory is by making "random" voters take literacy tests. During this time, when African-Americans would not have been taught well and gone to school, they would not be able to pass the literacy tests. Some did not even know how to read or write so they could not even read the test they were supposed to pass in order to be allowed to vote. Also, at this time, women would have been taught while in school about how to take care of the house. They would not have been expected to have gone out and gotten a job; they were taught only about home-making.
This law, in my opinion, is just a bit out-dated because some states that this Act was put in effect because of now would not discriminate so. In that, I mostly think that the Act is still a good idea because, as much as many people want to believe, our whole country is not all non discriminatory. Since George W. Bush signed a twenty-five year extention, I think that it should be very out-dated then and the legislation can deal with it then. But, as for now, I think that it should still be in affect because even though times are different and the country is very different everyone has a right and it would be a shame to have those taken away.