What is the 24th Amendment?

The 24th Amendment reads: 'Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax. Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.' The amendment applies to elections for federal office -- president, vice president, and members of Congress -- including the primaries for those offices. It is a categorical bar on financial charges as a condition of voting, not on other voting requirements.

A poll tax was a fixed fee charged to citizens as a condition of registering to vote or casting a ballot. Poll taxes were used in some states, particularly in the South, as one of several mechanisms -- alongside literacy tests and other barriers -- to suppress political participation after Reconstruction. By the early 1960s, five states still required a poll tax for voting in federal elections: Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia. Congress submitted the 24th Amendment to the states in 1962. South Dakota provided the 38th ratification on January 23, 1964, and the amendment took effect immediately. Poll taxes for federal elections became unconstitutional in every remaining state.

The 24th Amendment expressly covers only federal elections -- for president, vice president, and Congress. State-level elections were initially left to state law. The Supreme Court closed that gap in Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections, 383 U.S. 663 (1966), ruling 6-3 that poll taxes in state elections also violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment regardless of whether the 24th Amendment expressly reached them. After Harper, poll taxes became unconstitutional at every level of American government.

For the 2028 presidential election, the 24th Amendment means that no eligible citizen can be required to pay any tax or fee as a condition of voting in the presidential election, the primaries leading to it, or the congressional elections held on the same ballot. State voter ID laws -- requirements to present certain forms of identification -- are a separate legal framework: the Supreme Court upheld some photo ID requirements in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board (2008), provided they do not impose an undue burden and free IDs are available where required. The 24th Amendment's bar is specifically on taxes and financial charges. No eligible citizen faces a financial prerequisite to cast a ballot in 2028.