Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. ( September 2018 ) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message ).A grandfather clause (or grandfather policy or grandfathering ) is a provision in which an old rule continues to apply to some existing situations while a new rule will apply to all future cases.
Those exempt from the new rule are said to have grandfather rights or acquired rights, or to have been grandfathered in. For example, a grandfathered power plant might be exempt from new, more restrictive pollution laws, but the exception may be revoked and the new rules would apply if the plant were expanded. Often, such a provision is used as a compromise or out of practicality, to allow new rules to be enacted without upsetting a well-established logistical or political situation. This extends the idea of a rule not being retroactively applied. States in some cases exempted those whose ancestors ( grandfathers ) had the right to vote before the Civil War, or as of a particular date, from such requirements. The intent and effect of such rules was to prevent African-American former slaves and their descendants from voting, but without denying poor and illiterate whites the right to vote. Although these original grandfather clauses were eventually ruled unconstitutional, the terms grandfather clause and grandfather have been adapted to other uses. Paramilitary groups such as the White League, Red Shirts, and rifle clubs had intimidated blacks or barred them from the polls in numerous elections before what they called the Redemption (restoration of white supremacy). Nonetheless, a coalition of Populists and Republicans in fusion tickets in the 1880s and 1890s gained some seats and won some governor positions. To prevent such coalitions in the future, the Democrats wanted to exclude freedmen and other blacks from voting; in some states they also restricted poor whites to avoid biracial coalitions. Examples included imposition of poll taxes and residency and literacy tests. An exemption to such requirements was made for all persons allowed to vote before the American Civil War, and any of their descendants. The term grandfather clause arose from the fact that the laws tied the then-current generations voting rights to those of their grandfathers. According to Blacks Law Dictionary, some Southern states adopted constitutional provisions exempting from the literacy requirements descendants of those who fought in the army or navy of the United States or of the Confederate States during a time of war. United States (1915), states were forced to stop using the grandfather clauses to provide exemption to literacy tests. Without the grandfather clauses, tens of thousands of poor Southern whites were disenfranchised in the early 20th century. As decades passed, Southern states tended to expand the franchise for poor whites, but most blacks could not vote until after passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Ratification in 1964 of the Twenty-fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibited the use of poll taxes in federal elections, but some states continued to use them in state elections. Virginia Board of Elections that poll taxes could not be used in any elections. Ada Grandfather Clause Registration And TurnoutThis secured the franchise for most citizens, and voter registration and turnout climbed dramatically in Southern states. The modern analogue may be repudiating public debt, but the original was Henry II s principle, preserved in many of his judgments, Let it be as it was on the day of my grandfathers death, a principle by which he repudiated all the royal grants that had been made in the previous 19 years under King Stephen. Please improve the article by adding more descriptive text and removing less pertinent examples. See Wikipedias guide to writing better articles for further suggestions. February 2015 ). Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. September 2018 ) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message ).
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