FITCHBURG SENTINEL, Massachusetts, August 7, 1965

• Federal Voting Rights Act signing - Blacks - Negroes Civil Rights
• Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ)

This 10 page newspaper has a two column headline on page 6: "Vote Right Action Set By Justice Department"

Tells of the official signing of the Federal Voting Rights Act by Lyndon B. Johnson. A historic item in black Americana.

Other news of the day. Good condition.

wikipedia notes: The National Voting Rights Act of 1965 outlawed discriminatory voting practices that had been responsible for the widespread disenfranchisement of African Americans in the United States. Echoing the language of the 15th Amendment, the Act prohibited states from imposing any "voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure ... to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color." Specifically, Congress intended the Act to outlaw the practice of requiring otherwise qualified voters to pass literacy tests in order to register to vote, a principal means by which Southern states had prevented African-Americans from exercising the franchise. The Act was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, a Democrat, who had earlier signed the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law.

The Act was sent to Congress by President Johnson on March 17, 1965. The Senate passed the bill on May 11 (after a successful cloture vote on March 23); the House passed it on July 10. After differences between the two bills were resolved in conference, the House passed the Conference Report on August 3, the Senate on August 4. President Johnson signed the Act on August 6, 1965.