Grandfather clause
Grandfather Clause, a device once used by some states to discriminate against blacks in voting. At first these states imposed property-owning, tax-paying, and educational restrictions on the right to vote. Such requirements kept most blacks from voting, but also excluded many whites. Beginning with South Carolina in 1895, seven states adopted constitutional provisions that waived these requirements for men who had the right to vote—or whose ancestors had the right—on January 1, 1867. In 1915 the U.S. Supreme Court held the clause unconstitutional. The ruling was not enforced, however, and several states continued to use the grandfather clause until passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.