The 1965 Voting Rights Act created a significant change in the status of African Americans throughout the South. The Voting Rights Act prohibited the states from using literacy tests, interpreting the Constitution, and other methods of excluding African Americans from voting. Prior to this, only an estimated twenty-three percent of voting-age blacks were registered nationally, but by 1969 the number had jumped to sixty-one percent. This image shows a page in the US News and World Report including a picture of President Lyndon Johnson signing the bill into law.
"Signing the Voting Rights Act," August 6, 1965.
U.S. News and World Report, August 16, 1965.
Humanities and Social Sciences Division, General Collections. (9-20)
Copyright, August 16, 1965, U.S. News and World Report (www.usnews.com).