By Jahlil Rush
1868: The 14th Amendment was ratified and interpreted, during reconstruction, to grant citizenship to Black Americans. However, 14th Ammendment was specifically interpreted so as not to apply to Native Americans. “I am not yet prepared to pass a sweeping act of naturalization by which all the Indian savages, wild or tame, belonging to a tribal relation, are to become my fellow-citizens and go to the polls and vote with me,” said then-Senator Jacob Howard of Michigan, according to the Native American Voting Rights Coalition.
1912: Arizona became 48th state in the United States on February 14, 1912. Arizona originally belonged to the Spanish and Mexican territories. In 1863, the land became a separate territory.
1924: Native American people won full citizenship rights after President Calvin Coolidge signed the Indian Citizenship Act, also known as the Snyder Act. Although the 15th Amendment had passed by 1870, Native Americans were still not allowed to enjoy the full rights of citizenship until ratification of the Snyder Act. Neither Coolidge nor Congress promoted this law out of kindness. Rather, public opinion saw the act as a potential way to break up Native American nations and force them to assimilate.
1928: The case of Porter V. Hall tested Native American voting rights in Arizona. Two members of the Gila River Indian Community, Peter Porter and Rudolph Johnson, tried to register to vote in Pinal County, in advance of the presidential election in which Herbert Hoover would become President of the United States. Porter and Johnson were both denied the right to vote by the Pinal County recorder for two specific reasons, according to the Arizona Historical Society. First, the recorder said that state law did not apply to the men because they lived on the Gila River Indian Reservation. Second, the men were said to be “under guardianship.” Porter and Johnson were unsuccessful in their lawsuit.
1940: The Nationality Act of 1940 was passed in Congress and signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The law recognized citizenship to include Native Americans. After the act was passed, the military saw a 10 percent increase in Native American enlistment in World War II. However, Native Americans who contributed to United States war effort were still not allowed to vote in the elections of 1940.
1948: Native Americans finally won the right to vote when the Arizona Supreme Court overturned Porter v. Hall on July 15, 1948.
1965: The Voting Rights Act was passed by Congress in 1965, reinforcing voting rights for Native Americans in Arizona. Section 5 of the Act required nine states and parts of other states with a history of racial discrimination in voting to ask either the Department of Justice or a three-judge court in Washington, D.C. for approval before making any changes to voting laws—a process known as pre-clearance. It also gave Native Americans “a more active voice in the adoption of national, state, and local laws,” according to the American Civil Liberties Union. Section 2 of the Act specifically prohibited the denial of voting rights based on race or membership in a language minority, “defined as American Indians, Asian Americans, Alaskan Natives, and those of Spanish heritage.”
The state of Native American suffrage today: Native Americans continue to face voter suppression, fraud, and intimidation. Over 100 lawsuits have been filed to combat unjust voter suppression in Indian Country.