[EL] Voting Rights In US Territories

[Stephanie F Singer]

There is a lot of interesting history — in pleasant prose — in How to Hide an Empire, by Daniel Immerwahr. It includes the story of how the territories literally fell off the map. 

The language of the Voting Rights act quoted in this thread makes me wonder whether Puerto Rico is technically a “territory”. Is it both a “commonwealth" and a “territory”? What’s the legal basis for either of these categories?


> On Nov 11, 2021, at 8:36 AM, John Tanner <john.k.tanner at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Throwing bones to the colonies 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
>> On Nov 10, 2021, at 9:30 PM, Stephanie F Singer <sfsinger at campaignscientific.com> wrote:
>> 
>> DC and the five major territories each have an elected (non-voting) delegate in the House of Representatives.  For example, Stacey Plaskett (who was recently an impeachment manager) is the delegate from the Virgin Islands. 
>> 
>>> On Nov 10, 2021, at 4:52 PM, Steven John Mulroy (smulroy) <smulroy at memphis.edu <mailto:smulroy at memphis.edu>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> I thought that citizens living in Puerto Rico and the U.S. territories could not vote in federal elections, either for Congress or for the President. 
>>> But there appears to be this language in the Voting RIghts Act:
>>> Voting rights act of 1965” Sec. 4(e)(2) No person who demonstrates that he has successfully completed the sixth primary grade in a public school in, or a private school accredited by, any State or territory the District of Columbia, or the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in which the predominant classroom language was other than English, shall be denied the right to vote in any Federal, State, or local election because of his inability to read, write, understand, or interpret any matter in the English language, except that in States in which State law provides that a different level of education is presumptive of literacy, he shall demonstrate that he has successfully completed an equivalent level of education in a public school in, or private school accredited by, any State or territory, the District of Columbia, or the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in which the predominant classroom language was other than English.”  
>>> 
>>> Doe this refer to people who got educated in a territory but then moved to reside in a U.S. state? 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Steven J. Mulroy
>>> Bredesen Professor of Law
>>> University of Memphis
>>> 1 N. Front St. Memphis, TN 38103
>>> 901-678-4494
>>> Author of  Rethinking US Election Law https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/usd/rethinking-us-election-law-9781839106699.html <https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/usd/rethinking-us-election-law-9781839106699.html>
>>> Check out my scholarship at https://www.ssrn.com/index.cfm/en/ <https://www.ssrn.com/index.cfm/en/> 
>>> 

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