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this post was submitted on 23 Jul 2023
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Do you know why felons can't vote? How that started?
It was after the Civil War. Black people had the right to vote, but the Southern states didn't like that. They couldn't just say "black people can't vote anymore." That wouldn't have been allowed. So instead, they used a bunch of different voter suppression tactics to reduce how many black people could vote.
One of these tactics was removing the right to vote from convicted felons. The states first said that convicted felons couldn't vote. Then, they decided which crimes were felonies based on how many black people were convicted of those crimes. (Note, this might not have been how many black people COMMITTED the crimes, but how many black people could be rounded up and convicted despite the evidence.)
Black people in the South would get arrested for various crimes (again, with or without evidence), get convicted of felonies, and lose their right to vote. Even if they weren't convicted or charged, the message was clear: Stand up politically against White Men and you'll go to prison and lose your rights. The large black voting groups got smaller and smaller.
Removing the "felonies remove voting rights" rule reverses a discriminatory practice.