Chapter17 Section4 Activity
Southern Voting Restrictions
Southern leaders found ways to get around the 15th Amendment and prevent AFrican Americans from voting. Many Southern states required a poll tax because many African Americans could not afford the tax. They also made voters take a literacy test in which they had to explain difficult parts of state constitutions or the federal Constitution. The grandfather clauses allowed individuals who did not pass the literacy test to vote if their fathers or grandfathers had voted before Reconstruction.