Constitution Day: A look at the 24th-26th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution
Amendment 24: Outlaw of the Poll Tax
The federal Constitution's 13th, 14th and 15th amendments ended slavery, protected against state discrimination and guaranteed that people could not be denied the right to vote because of their race.
However, the 15th Amendment did completely not guarantee the right to vote, it only made it against the law to deny someone their right to voted based on their race. Enter the Poll Tax and other means such as literacy tests to deny the vote to citizens.The 24th Amendment to the Constitution outlawed the Poll Tax. Virginia, Alabama, Texas, Arkansas, and Mississippi were the only states to enforce a poll tax at the time of the ratification. The poll tax was deemed unconstitutional in 1966; the Supreme Court had deemed that it was in direct violation of the protection clause in the 14th Amendment (Source: http://constitution.laws.com/24th-amendment)
Amendment 26: The Vote for 18 year-olds
Want more information about Constitution Day? Use this Pass or go to the Library of Congress online.