Voting Rights Act Section 203

Federal law recognizes that many americans rely heavily on languages other than english and that they require information in minority languages in order to be informed voters and participate effectively in our representative democracy.

Voting rights act section 203. In july 2006 congress amended the voting rights act of 1965 now codified at title 52 united states code u s c 10301 et seq. Congress also broadened the scope of voting rights. The most recent determinations for section 203 were made on december 5 2016.

28 1986 100 stat. B determination of states and political subdivisions subject to requirements 1 existence of voting rights violations during previous 25 years a statewide application subsection a applies with respect to a. The state county or county subdivision under consideration is covered for that specific minority group of section 203 of the voting rights act.

Each of these amendments coincided with an impending expiration of some of the act s special provisions which originally were set to expire by 1970. Covered language minorities are limited to american indians asian americans alaskan natives and spanish heritage citizens the groups that congress. It was signed into law by president lyndon b.

In 1975 congress permanently banned the use of literacy tests and other discriminatory registration and voting practices including english only materials in any election nationwide. The rate of total voting age citizens that are limited english proficient and have less than a 5th grade education is higher than the national rate. Congress enacted major amendments to the voting rights act of 1965 in 1970 1975 1982 1992 and 2006.

The voting rights act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the united states that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. 10303 b is amended to read as follows. However in recognition of the voting discrimination that continued despite the act congress repeatedly amended the act to reauthorize the.

Johnson during the height of the civil rights movement on august 6 1965 and congress later amended the act five times to expand its protections. 584 which provided that such act see tables for classification was to be cited as the federal voting assistance act of 1955 was repealed by pub. Designed to enforce the voting rights guaranteed by the.