24th Amendment

Today in History, January 23: 1963 –

The Twenty-fourth Amendment to the Constitution is ratified, prohibiting the use of poll taxes during voting.

In the 1890’s Southern Democrats, seeing their power slipping with the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment (power of citizens to vote shall not be abridged based on race, color or previous status of servitude), had instituted poll taxes to make it more difficult for poor black and white southerners to vote. The 24th Amendment took a two decade long fight to pass.