Living in Infamy: Felon Disfranchisement and the History of American Citizenship PDF
Preview Living in Infamy: Felon Disfranchisement and the History of American Citizenship
L iving in Infamy PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd i 10/3/2013 7:43:11 PM R ecent Titles in S tudies in Crime and Public Policy M ichael Tonry and Norval Morris, General Editors T e Politics of Imprisonment H ow the Democratic Process Shapes the Way America Punishes Of enders V anessa Barker M aking Public Places Safer S urveillance and Crime Prevention B randon C. Welsh and David P. Farrington B anished T e New Social Control in Urban America K atherine Beckett and Steve Herbert P olicing Problem Places C rime Hot Spots and Ef ective Prevention A nthony A. Braga and David Weisburd T e Policing Web J ean-Paul Brodeur P unishing Race A Continuing American Dilemma M ichael Tonry T e Toughest Beat P olitics, Punishment, and the Prison Of cers Union in California J oshua Page T e City T at Became Safe N ew York’s Lessons for Urban Crime and its Control F ranklin E. Zimring C hildren of the Prison Boom M ass Incarceration and the Future of American Inequality S ara Wakef eld and Christopher Wildeman PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd ii 10/3/2013 7:43:13 PM L iving in Infamy F elon Disfranchisement and the History of American Citizenship P ippa Holloway 1 PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd iii 10/3/2013 7:43:13 PM 1 O xford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. I t furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, a nd education by publishing worldwide. O xford New York A uckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi K uala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi N ew Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto W ith of ces in A rgentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece G uatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore S outh Korea Switzerland T ailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam O xford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press i n the UK and certain other countries. P ublished in the United States of America by O xford University Press 1 98 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 © Oxford University Press 2014 A ll rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a r etrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior p ermission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, b y license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. I nquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights D epartment, Oxford University Press, at the address above. Y ou must not circulate this work in any other form a nd you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. L ibrary of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data H olloway, Pippa. Living in infamy : felon disfranchisement and the history of American citizenship / Pippa Holloway. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978–0–19–997608–9 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Political rights, Loss of— United States—States. 2. Ex-convicts—Suf rage—United States. 3. Election law—United States—States. 4. African American criminals. 5. Citizenship—United States. 6. Race discrimination—Law and legislation—United States. I. Title. KF9747.H65 2013 324.6'20869270973—dc23 2013017920 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 P rinted in the United States of America o n acid-free paper PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd iv 10/3/2013 7:43:14 PM F or my Dad PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd v 10/3/2013 7:43:14 PM PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd vi 10/3/2013 7:43:14 PM C ON T EN T S P reface i x I ntroduction 1 1 . “ Not Infamous, nor Subject to Another Man’s Will” 17 2 . “ Disqualif ed in Advance” 3 3 3 . “ A Chicken-Stealer Shall Lose His Vote” 5 4 4 . F urtive Of enses and Robust Crimes 79 5 . M aking New Men: Pardons and Restorations of Citizenship Rights 105 6 . C ourts, Voting Rights, and Black Protest in the Early Twentieth Century 132 C onclusion 1 51 A cknowledgments 1 63 N otes 1 67 B ibliography 2 13 I ndex 2 31 ( vii ) PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd vii 10/3/2013 7:43:14 PM PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd viii 10/3/2013 7:43:14 PM P R EFACE I n 1888 Democrats in Richmond, Virginia, came up with a plan to help their incumbent, George Wise, f ght of his Republican challenger in a race to represent the state’s third district in the U.S. Congress. Aware that African Americans voted predominately for Republican candidates, Richmond Democrats developed a strategy to obstruct their vote and limit their elec- toral impact. On election day, the party stationed “challengers”—of cial partisan election monitors—at the city’s three predominantly African American precincts in Jackson Ward, where they spent the day question- ing voter eligibility. Only African American voters underwent this inter- rogation. Each time a challenger disputed the credentials of a voter, the accusation had to be evaluated by an attendant panel of bipartisan precinct judges. T ese judges conf rmed with voters their age, the spelling of their name, and their place of residence. T e Democratic judges colluded with the Democratic challengers by slowly and carefully verifying the informa- tion on the registration lists. Any voter whose credentials were suspect had to swear an oath that he was qualif ed to vote, and each was informed he faced perjury charges if a later check of his credentials disqualif ed him. O ne particular kind of challenge took a disproportionate amount of time: voters who were accused of having a prior criminal conviction. Under Virginia’s constitution, individuals convicted of felonies or misdemeanor larceny could not vote. Prior to election day the precinct judges had received lists of voters made ineligible because of criminal conviction. Upon each challenge, the judges combed through the list of convicts, which contained about two thousand names, searching for that individual’s name. Because the segregated precinct had separate lines for the two races, white voting proceeded apace while African American voters waited for hours. Over f ve hundred black voters were still waiting in line to vote when the polls closed. 1 Many others had given up due to frustration or intimidation. D efenders of this process said these inquiries were appropriate and no delaying tactics had been used that day in Richmond. It took longer to check ( ix ) PippaHolloway020513OUS.indd ix 10/3/2013 7:43:14 PM
The list of books you might like
