Legal Definitions - literacy test

A literacy test was a formal assessment of an individual's ability to read and write, which was historically used in some U.S. states as a prerequisite for registering to vote. These tests were often implemented with the intention of disenfranchising specific groups of citizens, particularly African Americans in the South, but also immigrants and Native Americans in various regions, by creating an artificial barrier to their participation in elections. Congress officially banned the use of literacy tests as a condition for voter registration in 1975.

Here are some examples illustrating the application of literacy tests:

• Imagine it's 1962 in rural Mississippi. A 45-year-old African American woman, who has worked her entire life as a sharecropper and has limited formal schooling, attempts to register to vote. The county registrar presents her with a complex passage from the state constitution and demands she read it aloud, interpret its meaning, and answer several intricate questions about it. Despite her best efforts, she is deemed to have "failed" the literacy test and is denied the right to register, effectively preventing her from casting a ballot.

  This example demonstrates how literacy tests were used to selectively deny voting rights to African Americans by imposing subjective and often impossible standards, regardless of their citizenship or desire to participate in democracy.

• Consider an Italian immigrant who arrived in New York in 1910, having learned to read and write in Italian but with only basic conversational English. When he goes to register to vote, he is required to pass an English-language literacy test. Because the test demands a level of English reading and writing proficiency he has not yet acquired, he is unable to register and vote, even though he is a naturalized citizen and contributes to his community.

  This illustrates how literacy tests were also employed to suppress the votes of immigrant populations, particularly those from non-English speaking countries, by making English literacy a mandatory condition for exercising their franchise.

• In Arizona during the 1950s, a Native American man living on a reservation, whose primary language is Navajo and who received his education through tribal traditions rather than formal English schooling, seeks to register to vote. He is confronted with a state-mandated literacy test that requires him to read and write in English. Due to the language barrier and lack of access to English education, he is unable to pass the test and is therefore excluded from the voting process.

  This example highlights how literacy tests served as a barrier for Native American citizens, particularly those whose primary language was not English and who had limited access to mainstream educational opportunities, thereby limiting their political representation.