Essay On Disenfranchisement

Words: 964
Pages: 4

Apart from Maine and Vermont, most states chose to revoke felons right to vote while in prison and once released. There are eleven states that require felons to wait a set time before being able to vote in elections, three states that never allow felons to gain their voting rights back and the rest of the states have a large variety of policies regarding felon disenfranchisement. A felony is category of crimes that are the most serious of crimes one can commit and “felon” is the title given to anybody who has chosen to commit a felony crime. Drug abuse, with more than two million people convicted a year, is the most common of felonies and many people convicted of a felony are convicted of a non-violent crime. In the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause, also known as the Penalty Clause, the states are given the …show more content…
And still today, in 2016, states across America are using the Penalty Clause to disenfranchise African Americans and Hispanics at alarmingly high rates. The Due Process Clause is very vague in its description of disenfranchisement of convicted felons, but it is still important to mention because disenfranchisement is a constitutional power given to the state, whether felons should continue to be disenfranchised after being released can be debated however. When incarcerated men and women are released from prison, they should regain their voting rights. There are two main ways that disenfranchisement affects both male and female felons, socially and futuristically. Socially, felons find themselves unable to assimilate back into society upon release and with so many blacks and Hispanic unable to vote, passing beneficial legislation becomes nearly impossible. Additionally, disenfranchisement, when caused by mass-incarceration, is largely discriminatory and