Mississippi’s Jim Crow-era felony voting law is constitutional, federal court rules

Law passed in 1890 was tailored to exclude the Negro' but appeals court says tweaks in 20th century cleansed ... discriminatory taint'

A Jim Crow-era provision of the Mississippi constitution designed to disfranchise Black voters is constitutional, a federal appellate court ruled on Wednesday.

The case deals with a provision of the Mississippi constitution, Section 241, that lays out specific crimes that cause its citizens to permanently lose the right to vote. Mississippi officials initially adopted the provision at a constitutional convention in 1890, choosing crimes such as theft, arson, embezzlement and bigamy that they believed African Americans were more likely to commit. We came here to exclude the Negro," said the convention's president. Nothing short of this will answer."