Voting Rights Under The Constitution of 1816
Although Indiana's first constitution, adopted in 1816, did not specifically bar voting by African Americans or other persons of color, it guaranteed the right to vote only to white male citizens over the age of 21 who had lived in the state for one year. Although the Convention of 1850 adopted an article specifically prohibiting African Americans from voting, it nonetheless debated the issue of letting them vote.
Read more about this topic: Edward Ralph May
Famous quotes containing the words voting, rights and/or constitution:
“All voting is a sort of gaming, like checkers or backgammon, with a slight moral tinge to it, a playing with right and wrong, with moral questions; and betting naturally accompanies it. The character of the voters is not staked. I cast my vote, perchance, as I think right; but I am not vitally concerned that right should prevail. I am willing to leave it to the majority.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“If the veil were withdrawn from the sanctuary of domestic life, and man could look upon the fear, the loathing, the detestations which his tyranny and reckless gratification of self has caused to take the place of confiding love, which placed a woman in his power, he would shudder at the hideous wrong of the present regulations of the domestic abode.”
—Lydia Jane Pierson, U.S. women’s rights activist and corresponding editor of The Woman’s Advocate. The Woman’s Advocate, represented in The Lily, pp. 117-8 (1855-1858 or 1860)
“A constitution that is made for all nations is made for none.”
—Joseph De Maistre (1753–1821)