Political Quotes

“today I am pleased to introduce the Democracy Restoration Act. The Democracy Restoration Act, or DRA, had been introduced in previous Congresses by former Senator Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and I am proud to follow his example. I want to thank Senator Durbin for joining me as an original co-sponsor of this legislation. As the late Senator Kennedy often said, civil rights is the ``unfinished business'' of America. The Democracy Restoration Act would restore voting rights in federal elections to approximately 5 million Americans who have been released from prison and are back living in their communities. After the Civil War, Congress enacted and the states ratified the Fifteenth Amendment, which provides that ``the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.'' Unfortunately, many states passed laws during the Jim Crow period after the Civil War to make it more difficult for newly-freed slaves to vote in elections. Such laws included poll taxes, literacy tests, and disenfranchisement measures. Some disenfranchisement measures applied to misdemeanor convictions and in practice could result in lifetime disenfranchisement, even for individuals that successfully reintegrated into their communities as law-abiding citizens.…”