Universal suffrage facts for kids

In 1894 the parliament of the Colony of South Australia enacted legislation providing female adults franchise; giving all adults of the age of majority the right to vote in elections, and for any elector to stand for high office. In 1901, the self-governing colonies of Australia joined together in a federal structure of states. In 1902, the new federal parliament legislated for a white adult franchise and the right of electors to stand for and occupy any office for which they could directly vote. Indigenous people were explicitly excluded. True universal suffrage was not achieved until 1967 when the Commonwealth Electoral Act extended the right to vote to all Australians regardless of race. However, Australia was first united as a federation in 1901. Hence, white female voting rights were not enabled until the nation was united. Voting rights for all white men and women were established in 1902.

Somewhat reverted in 1925: women's voting age raised to 30, education and wealth requirements were raised. In rural constituencies open voting was reinstated. The rate of eligible citizens fell to 29%.

Extended to all men from 1869 to 1878 (First Spanish Republic and three first years of Bourbon Restoration) and from 1890 to the end of the Second Spanish Republic (1931–36). On 19 November 1933 women were granted the right to vote. Revoked during Franco era (1939–75) and recovered since 1977 in the new Spanish Constitution.

• In the colonial era, there had been various restrictions on suffrage in what is today the United States. Property restrictions on voting disenfranchised more than half of the white male population in most states.
• After the American Revolution, the Constitution did not originally define who was eligible to vote, allowing each state to determine who was eligible. In the early history of the U.S., most states allowed only white male adult property owners to vote (about 6% of the population). Vermont, Pennsylvania, and Kentucky were the three states to have full adult suffrage for white males before 1800. New Jersey allowed women's suffrage for landowners until the early 1800s.
• In the 1820 election, there were 108,359 ballots cast. In the 1840 election, 2,412,694 ballots were cast, an increase that far outstripped natural population growth. Poor voters became a huge part of the electorate. By 1856, after the period of Jacksonian democracy, all states had almost universal white adult male suffrage regardless of property ownership. Tax-paying requirements remained in five states, and two into the 20th century.
• In 1868, the 14th Amendment altered the way each state is represented in the House of Representatives. It counted all residents for apportionment including former slaves, overriding the three-fifths compromise, and reduced a state's apportionment if it wrongfully denied men aged 21 and above the right to vote. However, this was not enforced in practice. In 1870, the 15th Amendment granted suffrage to all males of any race, skin color, and ethnicity, including former slaves (freedmen), meaning that male African Americans in theory had the right to vote throughout the United States.
• Starting in 1888, former Confederate states passed Jim Crow laws and amendments to effectively disfranchise black and poor white voters through poll taxes, literacy tests, grandfather clauses and other restrictions, applied in a discriminatory manner. During this period, the Supreme Court generally upheld state efforts to discriminate against racial minorities; only later in the 20th century were these laws ruled unconstitutional. Black males in the Northern states could vote, but the majority of African Americans lived in the South.
• Wyoming was the first territory to enfranchise all women in 1869. From then until 1916, all Western states legalized women suffrage, but few Eastern states followed suit. However, in 1920 the 19th Amendment extended the franchise to women in all states.
• In 1924 the Indian Citizenship Act gave suffrage to all Native Americans, nearly two-thirds of whom already had citizenship and the right to vote.
• In 1943 Chinese immigrants were given the right to citizenship and the right to vote by the Magnuson Act. It allowed Chinese immigration for the first time since the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, and permitted some Chinese immigrants already residing in the country to become naturalized citizens.
• In 1962–1964, the nationwide "one man, one vote" electoral system was lawfully established mainly through the Warren Court's rulings in Baker v. Carr (1962), Reynolds v. Sims (1964), as well as Wesberry v. Sanders (1964).
• In 1964–1965, the 24th Amendment, which abolished the use of poll taxes as a requirement for voting in federal elections, was passed. Full enfranchisement was revived in 1965, with the passage of Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965, which provided for federal enforcement of rights. For state elections, it was not until the Warren Court ruled 6–3 in Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections (1966) that all state poll taxes were unconstitutional as violating the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. This removed a burden on the poor.
• In 1971, the 26th Amendment ratified, which granted suffrage for men and women aged 18.