81R3954 CBE-D
By: Ellis S.J.R. No. 27
A JOINT RESOLUTION
post-ratifying Amendment XXIV to the Constitution of the United
States prohibiting the denial or abridgment of the right to vote for
failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.
BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
SECTION 1. The 87th Congress of the United States, on August
27, 1962, in the form of Senate Joint Resolution No. 29, proposed to
the legislatures of the several states an amendment to the
Constitution of the United States, and by a proclamation dated
February 4, 1964, published at 29 Federal Register 1715-16 and at 78
Statutes at Large 1117-18, the Administrator of General Services,
Bernard L. Boutin--in the presence of native Texan, President
Lyndon Baines Johnson--declared the amendment to have been ratified
by the legislatures of 38 of the 50 states, thereby becoming
Amendment XXIV to the United States Constitution, pursuant to
Article V thereof, and reading as follows:
"AMENDMENT XXIV.
"SECTION 1. The right of citizens of the United
States to vote in any primary or other election for
President or Vice President, for electors for
President or Vice President, or for Senator or
Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or
abridged by the United States or any State by reason of
failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.
"SECTION 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce
this article by appropriate legislation."
SECTION 2. While the congress was still deliberating on the
poll tax amendment in August of 1962, President John Fitzgerald
Kennedy urged the United States House of Representatives to follow
the lead of the Senate and propose the amendment for the
consideration of the state legislatures ". . . to finally
eliminate this outmoded and arbitrary bar to voting. American
citizens should not have to pay to vote." And in witnessing the
issuance of Amendment XXIV's certificate of validity 17 months
later, Kennedy's successor, President Johnson, noted that
abolishing the tax requirement ". . . reaffirmed the simple but
unbreakable theme of this Republic. Nothing is so valuable as
liberty, and nothing is so necessary to liberty as the freedom to
vote without bans or barriers. . . . A change in our Constitution
is a serious event. . . . There can now be no one too poor to vote."
SECTION 3. Although Amendment XXIV has been the law of the
land since 1964, some 13 years following its effective date, it
received symbolic post-ratification in 1977 from the General
Assembly of the Commonwealth of Virginia, as reflected in the
Congressional Record of March 28, 1977, which printed the full text
of Virginia's post-ratification; 12 years after that, the amendment
gained ceremonial post-ratification in 1989 from the General
Assembly of the State of North Carolina, as reflected in the
Congressional Record of June 6, 1989, which printed the full text of
North Carolina's post-ratification; and nearly 13 years after that,
the amendment acquired its most recent post-ratification in 2002
from the Legislature of the State of Alabama, as reflected in the
Congressional Record of September 26, 2002, which printed the full
text of Alabama's post-ratification.
SECTION 4. The Legislature of the State of Texas--one of
only five states still levying a poll tax by 1964--has never
approved Amendment XXIV to the Constitution of the United States,
but precedent makes clear the opportunity of Texas to post-ratify
the amendment in a manner similar to the actions of lawmakers in
Alabama, North Carolina, and Virginia.
SECTION 5. The Legislature of the State of Texas, as a
symbolic gesture, hereby post-ratifies Amendment XXIV to the
Constitution of the United States.
SECTION 6. Pursuant to Public Law No. 98-497, the Texas
secretary of state shall notify the archivist of the United States
of the action of the 81st Legislature of the State of Texas, Regular
Session, 2009, by forwarding to the archivist an official copy of
this resolution.
SECTION 7. The Texas secretary of state shall also forward
official copies of this resolution to both United States senators
from Texas, to all United States representatives from Texas, to the
vice president of the United States in his capacity as presiding
officer of the United States Senate, and to the speaker of the
United States House of Representatives, with the request that this
resolution be printed in full in the Congressional Record.