Appellant alleges that she Is literate in Spanish. and that she studied American history and government in United States Spanishspeaking schools in Puerto Rico. She alleges further that she is "a regular reader of the New York City Spanishlanguage daily newspapers and other periodicals. which . . . provide proportionately more coverage of government and politics than do most Englishlanguage newspapers." and that she listens to Spanishlanguage radio broadcasts in New York which provide full treatment of governmental and political news. It is thus maintained that whatever may be the validity of literacy tests per se as a condition of voting. application of such a test to one literate in Spanish. in the context of the large and politically significant Spanishspeaking community in New York. serves no legitimate state interest. and is thus an arbitrary classification that violates the Equal Protection Clause. Although to be sure there is a difference between a totally Illiterate person and one who is literate in a foreign tongue. I do not believe that this added factor vitiates the constitutionality of the New York statute.
Keywords matched
literacy tests