Section 1:
The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.
Section 2:
The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Congress submitted the proposed Twenty-Sixth Amendment to the states for potential ratification on March 23, 1971 when the House of Representatives approved S.J. Res. 7.1 The Senate had previously passed the joint resolution on March 10.2 The Amendment attained the three-fourths majority of the states necessary for ratification a few months later on July 1.3 At a July 5 White House ceremony celebrating Independence Day, the Administrator of the General Services Administration officially certified the Amendment to have been ratified.4 President Richard Nixon remarked that the nation’s 11 million new young voters would contribute “a spirit of moral courage” and “high idealism” to the electorate.5
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Footnotes
- 1
- 117 Cong. Rec. 7570 (1971). See also Joint Resolution Proposing an Amendment to the Constitution of the United States Extending the Right to Vote to Citizens Eighteen Years of Age or Older, S.J. Res. 7, 92nd Cong., 1st Sess., 85 Stat. 825, 825 (1971). The introductory text of the joint resolution proposing the Twenty-Sixth Amendment required three-fourths of the state legislatures to ratify the Amendment within seven years of its submission to the states in order for it to become part of the Constitution. Id.
- 2
- 117 Cong. Rec. 5830 (1971).
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- 4
- Certification of Amendment to Constitution of the United States Extending the Right to Vote to Citizens Eighteen Years of Age or Older, 85 Stat. 829 (1971). President Nixon and three 18-year-old witnesses signed the certificate even though their signatures were not necessary for ratification. See id. At the time of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment’s ratification, federal law authorized the Administrator of General Services to certify that the states had ratified an amendment to the Constitution. See Act of Oct. 31, 1951, ch. 655, § 2(b), 65 Stat. 710, 710. In 1985, the National Archivist assumed this role. See Pub. L. No. 98-497, tit. I, §§ 107(d), 301, 98 Stat. 2285, 2291, 2295 (1984) (codified at 1 U.S.C. § 106b).
- 5
- President Richard Nixon, Remarks at a Ceremony Marking the Certification of the 26th Amendment to the Constitution (July 5, 1971), Am. Presidency Project, >https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-ceremony-marking-the-certification-the-26th-amendment-the-constitution. Congress subsequently provided for enforcement of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment against the states in federal courts. See 52 U.S.C. § 10701 (authorizing the Department of Justice to enforce the Amendment against state and local governments in federal district courts with expedited review and direct appeal to the Supreme Court; and criminalizing the denial or attempted denial of a person’s rights under the Amendment).