Speech #890058052

If this bill passes and the Court does otherwise. It will be abolishing the reserved powers of the States to establish voting qualifications and it will be approving powers for Congress far beyond the contemplated scope of the Constitution. It should be noted that the Supreme Court. on March 8. did not abolish literacy tests. It merely stated that the discriminatory use of these tests as between whites and Negroes has to stop and whole States can be brought in as defendants to bring this into reality. The present bill condemns literacy tests. in fact it suspends them. The Supreme Court for years has affirmed these tests as a reasonable exercise of a States authority under the Constitution to determine the qualifications of voters. In the case of Lassiter v. Northampton County Board of Electors. 360 U.S. 45 June 8. 1959. the Supreme Court upheld North Carolinas literacy test laws requiring that a voter "be able to read and write any section of the Constitution of North Carolina in the English language." The Court condemned literacy tests that have been employed as "a device to make racial discrimination easy." but found that this was not the case in North Carolina. I quote from the Courts opinion: The States have long been held to have broad powers to determine the conditions under which the rights of suffrage may be exercised. Literacy and illiteracy are neutral on race. creed. color. and sex as reports around the world show.