Before the Civil Rights Act

• The Civil Rights Voting Act of 1965 was actually the culmination of more than a century of political battles over freedom in the United States. While a few northern states allowed a small number of free black men to register and vote before the Civil War, according to the U.S. Department of Justice, the overwhelming majority of voters in America were white males, thanks to restrictive state laws and slavery.
  
  The 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1870. It provided that the right to vote not be denied on the condition of race. Nonetheless, groups such as the Ku Klux Klan continued to resist allowing African-Americans to vote through poll taxes, literary tests and disqualification from voting because of "crimes of moral turpitude."
  
  

What the Act Said

• Congress eventually realized the 15th Amendment didn't go far enough, and so President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Voting Act into law in 1965. The act followed the language of the 15th Amendment but banned laws requiring disenfranchising "literacy tests" at the polls. It allowed the creation of special jurisdictions of the country where voting laws could not be changed without the approval of the Attorney General or the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The Attorney General could also appoint a federal examiner in these areas who would review the qualifications of any person who wanted to vote.
  
  

Amendments

• The provisions of the Civil Rights Act allowing for the creation of special jurisdictions were extended in 1970 and 1975. Congress held hearings where testimony was given about efforts to disenfranchise voting through gerrymandering, annexation and at-large elections.
  
  Congress adopted new standards in 1982 under which jurisdictions could remove themselves from the coverage of a federal examiner. In 2006 the provision subjecting certain parts of the country to a federal monitor was extended again. The extension was challenged before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2009, which ultimately failed to rule on its constitutionality.
  
  

Enforcement

• The U.S. Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division is charged with enforcing the Civil Rights Voting Act of 1965, as well as various other civil rights laws. It was created in 1957 by Attorney General William P. Rogers. Anyone wishing to report a violation of these crimes can do so by filing a complaint with the agency.
  
  

Did the Act Work?

• Many people point to the election of President Barack Obama, the nation's first black president, as evidence of the progress that's been made since the days of disenfranchisement. Others point to voter registration records such as those in Alabama where, as reported by The New York Times, 72.9 percent of blacks are registered to vote as opposed to 73.8 percent of whites.
  
  Still others insist new racial barriers are being erected, especially in portions of the country subjected to a federal monitor. They point to studies such as those produced by the Southern Regional Council (SRC) as evidence. In SRC's 2008 study, Executive Director Hiewet Senghor points out that there has been an effort to remove "race" from modern political conversation.
  
  "In fact," Senghor wrote, "this approach often preserves racial injustice."