Early Victories in Tennessee Voting Rights Case

Progress is underway for voting rights restoration in Tennessee.

We filed a lawsuit in December 2020 challenging Tennessee’s process for restoring the right to vote for citizens previously convicted of a felony. Under Tennessee law, people with prior felony convictions are eligible to restore their right to vote if they meet certain criteria. However, Tennessee has created such a convoluted system that it’s nearly impossible for those who are eligible to actually vote. Tennessee requires people previously convicted of a felony to first obtain a “Certificate of Restoration” (COR) before they can register to vote. But less than 5% of the hundreds of thousands of potentially eligible Tennesseans have been able to acquire a COR.

This voter suppression scheme disproportionality impacts communities of color: as a result of Tennessee’s felony disenfranchisement law, more than 21% of the Black voting age population and more than 10% of the Latinx voting age population cannot vote.

Even though this case (full complaint available here) is only a few months old, we have already secured two key victories that will hopefully help more people be able to vote:

1.      Tennessee has updated its voter registration form and instructions to comply with the National Voter Registration Act. In our lawsuit, we highlighted problems with the older version of the registration form and instructions, including misleading information about who among those with felony convictions is eligible to vote. The voter registration website has now been updated to provide accurate information to would-be voters, though we have reason to believe that the older version of the voter registration form is still in circulation, so we remain vigilant.

2.      Rutherford County has agreed to stop charging an application fee for the COR, which is a necessary pre-requisite to registering to vote. By requiring would-be voters to pay a fee to get a COR, Rutherford County was charging a poll tax — and poll taxes are unconstitutional.

We are encouraged by these early victories. We will keep you updated as we continue to fight for the right to vote for the 451,000+ Tennesseans with felony records who are currently disenfranchised.