Federal court overturns Mississippi law stripping convicts of right to vote

JACKSON, Mississippi – A federal appeals court has ruled unconstitutional a Mississippi state law that permanently disenfranchises people with certain criminal records.

The law was passed in 1890 by white lawmakers during the Jim Crow era and was used to disenfranchise Black voters.

The court ruled that the law violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.

It also violates the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection before the law.

The ruling is a victory for civil rights groups that have challenged the law for years.

It could pave the way for tens of thousands of Mississippians to regain their right to vote.

“In the last 50 years, a national consensus has emerged among the state legislatures against permanently disenfranchising those who have satisfied their judicially imposed sentences and thus repaid their debts to society,” the ruling stated. 

“Mississippi stands as an outlier among its sister states, bucking a clear national trend in our nation against permanent disenfranchisement.”

The law disenfranchises people convicted of 10 specific felonies, eight of which were selected by all-white delegates in 1890.

 They are based on the belief that Black were more likely than whites to be convicted of these crimes.

The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed in 2018 by the Southern Poverty Law Center and ACLU on behalf of Dennis Hopkins.

He had been ineligible to vote since 1998 due to a grand theft conviction.

Black Mississippians make up 36% of Mississippi’s voting-age population, but 59% of the disenfranchised.

There are currently more than 20 crimes that disenfranchise Mississippians from voting. The state—which according to the Sentencing Project is one of only 12 with lifetime disenfranchisement—added 11 more offenses to the ban list in 2005.