The first vote and the price of myth

Banned Histories of Race in America

Harper's Weekly Cover, "The First Vote," November 16, 1867

Did you know Black men got the right to vote in Southern states years before getting the same right in most Northern states – and almost a century before what is commonly believed?

Most American think that Black folks weren’t allowed to vote in the US until after the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The truth is Black men got the right to vote in the former confederate states when the Reconstruction Act was passed in 1867. With the exceptions of Maine and Vermont, Black men didn’t have right to vote in Northern states for three more years, when the 15^th Amendment was ratified in 1870.