Our Time Is Now: Power, Purpose, and the Fight for a Fair America

by Stacey Abrams

Literacy tests were a favored tool borrowed from the Northeast, and they were particularly popular because both immigrants and freed Black Americans often had limited education. Connecticut pioneered literacy tests in 1855 to limit access to the ballot and exclude Irish immigrants. Under these tests, voters would have to prove their command of language by reading a passage aloud and then answering questions showing their reading comprehension to the satisfaction of the examiner. Of course, the tests were administered in a fashion that made it harder for those whom the establishment wanted to disenfranchise. In Alabama, for example, white voters would be asked to read and discuss an eight-word passage from Section 20 of the state’s constitution, which simply states, “That no person shall be imprisoned for debt.” The Black voter, however, would be asked to read and explain the entirety of Section 260, 187 words of convoluted language that established laws of taxation and state bonds.2 For most of us born after the end of literacy tests, we have a vague grasp on what hurdles our parents and grandparents faced to vote, let alone their grandparents. Black voters had to unravel complex laws that trained lawyers would have trouble deciphering. All in a bid to cast a vote. Similarly, Southern states levied poll taxes, a requirement of payment for the right to cast a ballot. But these also existed in the North, including in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania, where...