Fifteenth Amendment
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 307 U.S. 268 - Lane v. Wilson · 1939Most cited · 995 citing opinions
The Amendment nullifies sophisticated as well as simple-minded modes of discrimination. It hits onerous procedural requirements which effectively handicap exercise of the franchise by the colored race although the abstract right to vote may remain unrestricted as to race.
How often courts cite the cases defining “Fifteenth Amendment”
Court decisions citing the 2 opinions that defined “Fifteenth Amendment” — 1,496 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 2 definitions, chronological · 1915–1939
- ORIGINAL
The Amendment does not take away from the state governments in a general sense the power over suffrage which has belonged to those governments from the beginning... But it is equally beyond the possibility of question that the Amendment in express terms restricts the power of the United States or the states to abridge or deny the right of a citizen of the United States to vote on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. The restriction is coincident with the power and prevents its exertion in disregard to the command of the Amendment.