SOURCE: PRNewswire
WASHINGTON, March 7, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Following is the daily “Profile America” feature from the U.S. Census Bureau: VOTER REGISTRATION Profile America — Tuesday, March 7th. The right to vote began to receive some supervision more than two centuries ago, when Massachusetts acted on this date in 1801 to register voters. At that time, the franchise was limited to men — usually those of local repute and owning property. Town assessors drew up publicly posted lists of voters. If any voter was omitted, documents proving eligibility were accepted. The practice caught on very slowly. Only after the Civil War did voter registration become widespread. Today, North Dakota is the only state without a registration requirement, although proof of residency must be shown. In 2014, out of a voting age population of nearly 220 million citizens, over 64 percent were registered to vote. In Massachusetts, registration was just under 62 percent. You can find more facts about America from the U.S. Census Bureau online at www.census.gov. Sources: Kane’s Famous First Facts, 3424 Development of voter registration/pages 456 & 457/accessed 1230/2016: http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1027&context=wmborj North Dakota voting/accessed 12/30/2016: http://www.nd.gov/sos/electvote/voting/voter-qualifi.html Lack of registration/accessed 1230/2016: https://vip.sos.nd.gov/pdfs/Portals/votereg.pdf National registration/Current Population Survey/Table 1: http://census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/voting-and-registration/p20-577.html State registration/Current Population Survey/Table 4a: http://census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/voting-and-registration/p20-577.html Profile America is produced by the Center for New Media and Promotion of the U.S. Census Bureau. Statistics and accounts drawn from cited non-Census sources are employed for illustrative or narrative purposes, and are not attested to by the U.S. Census Bureau. These daily features are available as produced segments, ready to air, on the Internet at http://www.census.gov (look for “Audio” in the “Library” pull-down menu). SOURCE U.S. Census Bureau Related Links http://www.census.gov
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