What are Voting rights?

Answer 1

Throughout history, only certain groups of people were allowed to cast a ballot to decide who would lead the state or the nation. Usually, those allowed to vote in political elections were male and owned property. In some countries, the voters had to be white or they had to belong to a certain religion. Even the US Constitution, a surprisingly modern document when it came to protecting freedom of speech and freedom of religion, did not give women or black people the right to vote. That did not change for black men till 1870, when the 15th amendment was ratified, giving them the right to vote. Women (both black and white) did not get the right to vote till 1920, when the 22nd amendment was ratified.

The problem is that while on paper, black people had the right to vote, in reality, in the deep south, where segregation was a way of life, white authorities regularly denied even the most educated and qualified black voters the right to cast their ballot in elections; in some cities, blacks who tried to vote were physically prevented from entering the voting place, and sometimes violence was used against them. The voting rights movement was part of the struggle for civil rights during the 1950s and 1960s; its goal (which it did finally achieve) was to put an end to these exclusionary practices, so that any citizen eligible to vote would at last be able to do so, no matter what color that voter might be.