The minority of white Democrats in these states controlled the political process and elections, gaining outsize power locally and in Congress as the Solid South. In practice, in their system of Jim Crow, these elements were used to disenfranchise most African Americans and many poor whites from voting, excluding thousands of people in each state from the political system. Historically in the United States, the southern states of the former Confederacy passed new constitutions and laws at the turn of the century that created barriers to voter registration, such as poll taxes, literacy tests, grandfather clauses, and complicated record keeping requirements.
Registration laws making it harder for voters to register correlate strongly with lower percentages of people turning out to vote where voting is voluntary.
The United States, for example, the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 ("Motor Voter Law") and similar laws require states to offer voter registration at motor vehicle departments (driver's license offices) as well as disability centers, public schools, and public libraries, in order to offer more access to the system.
In countries where resident registration is compulsory, voter registration usually does not exist, since voter eligibility can be determined from the residence register.Įven in countries where registration is the individual's responsibility, many reformers, seeking to maximize voter turnout, argue for a wider availability of the required forms, or more ease of process by having more places where they can register.
In jurisdictions where registration is not mandatory, an effort may be made to encourage persons otherwise eligible to vote to register, in what is called as a voter registration drive. Some jurisdictions have "election day registration" and others do not require registration, or may require production of evidence of entitlement to vote at time of voting.
In some jurisdictions, an enrollment agency may receive change of address information from other government agencies, which is used to automatically update voter details for example, when a person registers a change of residence with a government agency for, say, a driver's license, the government agency may forward the information to the electoral agency to update voter registration details. In some jurisdictions, enrollment may require an application being made by an eligible voter and registered persons to re-register or update registration details when they change residence or other relevant information changes. In most jurisdictions, voting and registration is optional, while in others (such as in Australia) registration and voting are compulsory for citizens of voting age. The rules governing registration vary between jurisdictions. In electoral systems, voter registration (or enrollment) is the requirement that a person otherwise eligible to vote must register (or enroll) on an electoral roll, which is usually a prerequisite for being entitled or permitted to vote.