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18 B. C. Third World L. J. 71 (1998)
Porsche or Pinto: The Impact of the Motor Voter Registration Act on Black Political Participation

handle is hein.journals/bctw18 and id is 77 raw text is: PORSCHE OR PINTO? THE IMPACT OF THE MOTOR VOTER REGISTRATION ACT ON BLACK POLITICAL PARTICIPATION NATHAN V. GEMMITI* I. INTRODUCTION The Declaration of Independence proclaims that the government derives its powers from the consent of the governed.1 The framers of the Constitution wrote the words, We the People, to create a country founded on the principles of freedom, democracy, and equality.2 Ironi- cally, these ideals co-existed within a political structure that excluded from the right to self-government anyone who was not a white lan- downing male.5 The creative contradiction of all men are created equal, did not begin to erode until the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870, when Black4 men in America were given the right to vote.5 It would be another fifty years before Black women would also be enfranchised.6 Since the adoption of the Bill of Rights, five consti- tutional amendments have dealt with voting.7 The United States' his- tory of political disenfranchisement lingers and continues to perpetu- ate a democratic system where only half of the population votes.8 As recently as 1965, when Martin Luther King, Jr. led non-violent protests in Selma, Alabama, to bring civil rights to the nation's attention, only * Executive Editor, BosToN COLLEGE THIRD WORLD LAW JOURNAL. 1THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE para. 2 (U.S. 1776). 2 U.S. CoNST. pmble. 3 See infra notes 55-58. In the first presidential election of George Washington, only 6% of the population voted. Donald W. Rogers, Introduction: The Right to Vote in American History, in VOTING AND THE SPIrr OF A.mmucAN DmEocRAcy 6 (Dopald W. Rogers ed., 1992). 41 use Black throughout this Note to refer to American citizens of African descent Black is capitalized because it denotes racial and cultural identities, not solely physical appearance. Conversely, the word 'vhite is not capitalized because it is not ordinarily used in the same sense. See Kennenth B. Nunn, Rights Held Hostage: Race, Ideology and the Peremptory Challenge, 28 HARv. C.R.-C.L. L. Rv. 63, 64 n.7 (1993). 5 See U.S. CoNsT. amend. XV, § 1. 6 See U.S. CONST. amend. XIX, § 1. 7 See generally U.S. CONST. amends. XIV, XV, XIX, XXIV, XXVI. 8 See NELSON W. PoLsBY & AARON WiLDAvSxy, PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS: STRATEGIES AND STRUCTURES IN AmERiCAN POLITICS 3 (9th ed. 1996).

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