On cover, the word "right" has an x drawn over the letter "r" with the letter "f" above it.

Elections are not just about who casts ballots – they reflect the citizens, parties, media, and history of an electorate. Fighting for Votes examines how these factors interacted during a recent Ontario election. The authors begin by examining the province’s political culture and history. They then delve deeply into the campaign by exploring three lines of enquiry that help define representative democracy: How do parties position themselves to appeal to voters? How is information from and about parties transmitted to voters? And how do voters respond to the information around them? Looking at information from a wealth of sources – from political party websites and debate transcripts to Twitter feeds – they provide a sophisticated analysis of the interplay between voters and political parties in an era of new media. The most complete account of a provincial election available, Fighting for Votes illuminates the evolving electoral landscape.

The struggle for voting rights was not limited to African Americans in the South. American Indians also faced discrimination at the polls and still do today. This book explores their fight for equal voting rights and carefully documents how non-Indian officials have tried to maintain dominance over Native peoples despite the rights they are guaranteed as American citizens. Laughlin McDonald has participated in numerous lawsuits brought on behalf of Native Americans in Montana, Colorado, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Wyoming. This litigation challenged discriminatory election practices such as at-large elections, redistricting plans crafted to dilute voting strength, unfounded allegations of election fraud on reservations, burdensome identification and registration requirements, lack of language assistance, and noncompliance with the Voting Rights Act. McDonald devotes special attention to the VRA and its amendments, whose protections are central to realizing the goal of equal political participation. McDonald describes past and present-day discrimination against Indians, including land seizures, destruction of bison herds, attempts to eradicate Native language and culture, and efforts to remove and in some cases even exterminate tribes. Because of such treatment, he argues, Indians suffer a severely depressed socioeconomic status, voting is sharply polarized along racial lines, and tribes are isolated and lack meaningful interaction with non-Indians in communities bordering reservations. Far more than a record of litigation, American Indians and the Fight for Equal Voting Rights paints a broad picture of Indian political participation by incorporating expert reports, legislative histories, newspaper accounts, government archives, and hundreds of interviews with tribal members. This in-depth study of Indian voting rights recounts the extraordinary progress American Indians have made and looks toward a more just future.

Written in vivid prose and with a keen eye for detail, Women's Equality in America is a valuable resource for understanding the issues and trends that dominate public discourse in discussions of women's rights and gender equality in America. Since its inception, the women's equality movement in America has been criticized for moving too slowly, moving too quickly, being too demanding, or not being demanding enough. Some of its goals have aroused passionate opposition in those who believed women's equality contradicted not only basic human biology, but also the word of God. Meanwhile, Americans voice starkly different opinions about where women stand in their quest for equality in American workplaces, classrooms, boardrooms, and homes. Women's Equality in America: Examining the Facts presents sensibly organized and accurate summaries of the relevant facts concerning all of these claims and counterclaims. But while the volume is primarily concerned with providing an accurate picture of the state of women's equality in the 21st century, it also provides vital contextual coverage of major historical turning points and important historical figures, from leaders of the Seneca Falls women's rights convention in 1848 to the organizers of the #MeToo movement.

Shows the maddening difficulties that voter ID requirements create for participants in US democracy and offers concrete solutions for every person’s vote and voice to count Over the past decade, and throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of voter ID laws has skyrocketed, limiting the ability of nearly twenty-five million eligible voters from exercising their constitutional right to cast a vote. In States of Confusion, Don Waisanen, Sonia Jarvis, and Nicole Gordon explore this crisis and the difficulties it has created for American voters, offering practical solutions for this increasingly important problem. Focusing on ten states with the strictest voter documentation requirements, the authors show how people face major barriers to exercising their fundamental democratic right to vote and are therefore slipping through the cracks of our electoral system. They explore voter experiences by drawing on hundreds of online surveys, audits of 150 election offices, community focus groups, and more. Waisanen, Jarvis, and Gordon call on policymakers to adopt uniform national voter identification standards that are simple, accessible, and cost-free. States of Confusion offers a comprehensive and up-to-date look at the voter ID crisis in our country, as well solutions for practitioners, government agencies, and citizens.

This invaluable resource covers all aspects of 1920s political, artistic, popular, and economic culture in America, supporting the AP U.S. history curriculum through topical and biographical entries, primary documents, sample documents-based essay questions, and period-specific learning objectives. The 1920s, despite President Harding's "return to normalcy," were a time of both great cultural and social advancement as well as various forms of oppression in the United States. Bookended in history by two world wars, this period saw the rise of tabloid journalism and mass media; the banning and reinstatement of alcohol; the advent of voting rights for women and Native Americans; movements such as the Red Scare, labor strikes, the Harlem Renaissance, and racial protests; and the global reorganization that occurred as the major powers fumbled their way through postwar foreign policy and the League of Nations. Almost no element of U.S. society was untouched. The New Era of the 1920s: Key Themes and Documents provides high school students taking the Advanced Placement (AP) U.S. history course and undergraduates taking a lower level American history survey course with an invaluable study guide and targeted test preparation material. Much more than just an AP test-taking study guide, this new title in ABC-CLIO's Unlocking American History series is a true reference source for the societal, political, and economic history of a specific period covered in the AP U.S. history course. Readers will also benefit from features designed for student exam preparation, such as a sample documents-based essay question and period-specific learning objectives that are in alignment with the 2014 AP U.S. History Curriculum Framework.

Looks at the history of the women's suffrage movement in the United States, highlighting major events and players.

In this profoundly polarized era, the nation has been transfixed on the politics of Washington and its seemingly impenetrable gridlock. Many of the decisions that truly affect people’s lives, however, are being made not on the federal level but in the states. Faced with Washington’s political standoff, state governments are taking action on numerous vital issues, often impacting citizens and their communities far more than the decision makers in D.C. Despite this, few Americans really understand their state governments or the issues they address. In Fighting Political Gridlock, David Toscano reveals how the states are working around the impasse in Washington and how their work is increasingly shaping society. Long a central figure in one of the most important legislative bodies in the nation, the Virginia House of Delegates, Toscano brings a unique expertise to this urgent and timely discussion. Beginning with an analysis of state responses to COVID-19, including the processes and consequences of declaring states of emergency, he goes on to detail how various states are attacking issues in different ways–from education and voting to criminal justice and climate change–and provides a broad overview of how state actions affect our system of federalism. Toscano concludes with a call to action and civic engagement, including suggestions for how citizens and public officials can revitalize American democracy.

Awakening bears witness to the most egregious disparities between African American people and white people caused by the structural injustice inherent in virtually every institution in the United States.

"The Radical Imagination of Black Women: Ambition, Politics and Power explores how elite Black women decide to seek political office. Despite their marginalized existence Black women engage in a robust political participation that includes seeking elected office. Utilizing interviews of Black women who currently or have served in office and focus group data of Black women, the manuscript bridges the literatures of ambition theory and marginalization through a theory I refer to a "ambition on the margins". Black women's resistance to marginalization informs us about the conditions that shape Black women and their political socialization, while ambition theory helps us understand what they do in response to marginalization. The socialization process fosters the decision-making process of Black women. This framework moves the extant literature beyond the premise that the political ambition of Black women is less than White women or men. Political science's approach to ambition negates and disregards mechanisms beyond voting that Black women often engage in such as doing political work through community and civic organizations. That data provided from interviews reveal the complex dynamics that contribute to the nuanced process that Black women emerge as candidates and engage as politicians"--