Civil Rights Movement In The 1960s Essay

The drive to lower the voting age from 21 to 18 grew rapidly in the late 1960’s. Students’ activism movements protesting the Vietnam War gave rise to this and following Supreme Court’s case Oregon vs. Mitchell, it was widely believed that a new amendment to the constitution should to be drafted. The amendment was quickly proposed on March 23rd, 1971 and ratified by 42 states on July 1st, 1971(laws.com). The Twenty Sixth amendment of the United States Constitution prohibits the states and federal government from using age as a reason to deny any American citizen, 18 years and older, the right to vote. It gave young adults a voice in local, state, and national elections.
With the civil rights movement growing in the 1960’s, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. This lowered the minimum
But as the war dragged on and its vainness began to become apparent, support for it began to dissolve. Discussions on university campuses ignited a national debate over the war before the dispute developed inside the Federal Government itself. By late 1967, most American students that were against the war became a major political force. Enormous peace rallies consisting of students were held in New York, Washington D.C, and other cities drew broad public attention to the antiwar movement. Although these students were not allowed to vote yet, they proved themselves as intellectual equals to those above the age of 21. This also proved that they had a voice and their influence showed that their opinion mattered. This escalated the growing movement of lowering the national voting age. Many different arguments were made for the amendment, one famous slogan that was used by young soldiers during the Vietnam War was: “Old enough to fight, old enough to vote!” (Brinkley). With all the different activist movements led by 18-21 year-olds, it was widely accepted that they should have the right to