Day 16: Minority Provisions – Countdown to November 3rd | Reflections on Voter Access

16 Days Remaining

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was amended 10 years after its passage. The amendment contained many important provisions that made voting more accessible to the United States diverse population. One of the most valuable sections of the revised legislation was Section 203, which provides:

“Whenever any State or political subdivision [covered by the section] provides registration or voting notices, forms, instructions, assistance, or other materials or information relating to the electoral process, including ballots, it shall provide them in the language of the applicable minority group as well as in the English language.”

Congress made this decision after finding, “through the use of various practices and procedures, citizens of language minorities have been effectively excluded from participation in the electoral process….The Congress declares that, in order to enforce the guarantees of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments to the United States Constitution, it is necessary to eliminate such discrimination by prohibiting these practices.”

The Language Minority Provisions of the Voting Rights Act required that translated voting materials and resources would be available, accurate, and easily accessible in areas with large numbers of citizens with limited English proficiency. This includes that these jurisdictions and their respective local governments will provide registration or voting notices, forms, instructions, assistance, or other materials or information relating to the electoral process, including ballots. The jurisdictions that are required to  provide these materials in the language of the applicable minority group are determined using data from The United States Census Bureau. 

The Justice Department stated that the assistance helps our country be more inclusive, by allowing citizens to “be informed voters and participate effectively in our representative democracy.” The Voting Rights Act has been extended and reauthorized many times, and the most recent determinations for covered jurisdictions were made on December 5th, 2016. 

Language is powerful. It connects, or divides us, based on how it is used. Understanding is built and maintained through language, and the exclusion of an incredibly significant percent of the population defeats the very idea of democracy, as the government is then not truly built by the people and for the people.