H.Res. 756

[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 756 Introduced in House (IH)]

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119th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 756

Supporting the designation of September 2025 as ``National Voting 
Rights Month''.

_______________________________________________________________________

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

September 19, 2025

Mr. Veasey (for himself, Mr. Scott of Virginia, Ms. Sewell, Ms. 
Williams of Georgia, Mr. Green of Texas, Ms. Meng, Mr. Johnson of 
Georgia, Mr. Fields, Mr. Deluzio, Ms. Barragan, Ms. Johnson of Texas, 
Mr. Mullin, Ms. Davids of Kansas, Ms. Kamlager-Dove, Mrs. Watson 
Coleman, Ms. McClellan, Mr. Cleaver, Mr. Carter of Louisiana, Ms. 
Plaskett, Ms. McCollum, Mr. Olszewski, Ms. Ansari, and Ms. Crockett) 
submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee 
on the Judiciary, and in addition to the Committees on House 
Administration, Science, Space, and Technology, Oversight and 
Government Reform, Financial Services, Ways and Means, Natural 
Resources, and Homeland Security, for a period to be subsequently 
determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such 
provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned

_______________________________________________________________________

RESOLUTION

Supporting the designation of September 2025 as ``National Voting 
Rights Month''.

Whereas voting is one of the single most important rights that can be exercised 
in a democracy;
Whereas, over the course of history, various voter suppression laws in the 
United States have hindered, and even prohibited, certain individuals 
and groups from exercising the right to vote;
Whereas, during the 19th and early 20th centuries, Native Americans, people who 
were born to United States citizens abroad, people who spoke a language 
other than English, and people who were formerly subjected to slavery 
were denied full citizenship and prevented from voting by English 
literacy tests;
Whereas, since the 1870s, minority groups, such as Black Americans in the South, 
have suffered from the oppressive effects of Jim Crow laws that were 
designed to prevent political, economic, and social mobility;
Whereas Black Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and other 
underrepresented voters were subject to violence, poll taxes, literacy 
tests, all-White primaries, property ownership tests, and grandfather 
clauses designed to suppress the right of those underrepresented 
individuals to vote;
Whereas, as of 2024, 4,404,000 people in the United States were disenfranchised 
from voting because of a felony conviction, including 1 in 16 Black 
adults, due to the shameful entanglement of racial injustice in the 
criminal justice system and access to voting in the United States;
Whereas members of the aforementioned groups and others are currently subject to 
intimidation, voter roll purges, and financial barriers that effectively 
act as modern-day poll taxes;
Whereas, in 1965, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (52 U.S.C. 10301 
et seq.) in large part to protect the right of Black Americans and other 
traditionally disenfranchised groups to vote;
Whereas, in 2013, in the landmark case of Shelby County v. Holder, 570 U.S. 529 
(2013), the Supreme Court invalidated section 4 of the Voting Rights Act 
of 1965 (52 U.S.C. 10303), dismantling the preclearance formula 
provision that protected voters in States and localities that have 
historically suppressed the right of minorities to vote by requiring 
those states to receive preapproval from the Federal Government for 
changes in voting laws;
Whereas, since the invalidation of the preclearance formula provision of the 
Voting Rights Act of 1965 (52 U.S.C. 10301 et seq.), gerrymandered 
districts in many States go unchallenged and are less likely to be 
invalidated by the courts;
Whereas gerrymandered districts in many States have been found to have a 
discriminatory impact on traditionally disenfranchised minorities 
through tactics that include ``cracking'', diluting the voting power of 
minorities across many districts, and ``packing'', concentrating the 
power of minority voters into one district to reduce their voting power 
in other districts;
Whereas the courts have found the congressional and, in some cases, State 
legislative district maps in Texas, North Carolina, Florida, 
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, Alabama, and Louisiana to be 
gerrymandered districts created to favor some groups over others, and 
State legislatures with Republican majorities are actively working to 
further gerrymander districts before the next Federal election;
Whereas some States have implemented new voting restrictions that make it more 
difficult to vote, including cutbacks in the availability of early 
voting, voter roll purges, placement of faulty equipment in minority 
communities, requirement of photo identification, and the elimination of 
same-day registration;
Whereas those policies could outright disenfranchise or make voting much more 
difficult for more than 80,000,000 minority, elderly, poor, and disabled 
voters, among other groups;
Whereas, in 2016, discriminatory laws in North Carolina, Wisconsin, North 
Dakota, and Texas were ruled to violate the rights of voters and were 
overturned by the courts;
Whereas the decision of the Supreme Court in Shelby County v. Holder, 570 U.S. 
529 (2013), calls on Congress to update the formula in the Voting Rights 
Act of 1965 (52 U.S.C. 10301 et seq.);
Whereas addressing the challenges of administering future elections requires 
increasing the accessibility of vote-by-mail and other limited-contact 
options to ensure access to the ballot and the protection of the health 
and safety of voters, and access to the ballot amid a global pandemic 
like the public health emergency caused by the Coronavirus Disease 2019;
Whereas Congress must work to combat any attempts to dismantle or underfund the 
United States Postal Service or obstruct the passage of the mail as 
blatant tactics of voter suppression and election interference;
Whereas, following the 2020 elections, there has been a relentless attack on the 
right to vote with more than 400 bills introduced and at least 44 bills 
signed into law in 18 States to restrict the right to vote;
Whereas there is much more work to be done to ensure all citizens of the United 
States have the right to vote through free, fair, and accessible 
elections, and Congress must exercise its constitutional authority to 
protect the right to vote;
Whereas National Voter Registration Day in 2025 is Tuesday, September 16; and
Whereas September 2025 would be an appropriate month--

(1) to designate as ``National Voting Rights Month''; and

(2) to ensure that, through the registration of voters and awareness of 
elections, the democracy of the United States includes all citizens of the 
United States: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
(1) expresses support for a ``National Voting Rights 
Month'';
(2) encourages all people in the United States to uphold 
the right of every citizen to exercise the sacred and 
fundamental right to vote;
(3) encourages Congress to pass--
(A) the Freedom to Vote Act (H.R. 11, S. 1, 118th 
Congress), to set national standards to expand voter 
registration and voting access, advance election 
integrity reforms, and protect the democracy of the 
United States;
(B) the Democracy Restoration Act of 2023 (H.R. 
4987, S. 1677, 118th Congress), to restore Federal 
voting rights to citizens after release from 
imprisonment, honoring the responsibilities of 
citizenship and civic engagement necessary for building 
healthy and safe communities while welcoming the civic 
contributions of people returning home after 
imprisonment; and
(C) other voting rights legislation that seeks to 
advance voting rights and protect elections in the 
United States;
(4) recommends that public schools and universities in the 
United States develop an academic curriculum that educates 
students about--
(A) the importance of voting, how to register to 
vote, where to vote, and the different forms of voting;
(B) the history of voter suppression in the United 
States before and after passage of the Voting Rights 
Act of 1965 (52 U.S.C. 10301 et seq.); and
(C) current measures that are restricting the right 
to vote;
(5) expresses appreciation for the United States Postal 
Service for issuing a special Representative John R. Lewis 
stamp--
(A) to honor the life and legacy of Representative 
John R. Lewis in supporting voting rights; and
(B) to remind people in the United States that 
ordinary citizens risked their lives, marched, and 
participated in the great democracy of the United 
States so that all citizens would have the fundamental 
right to vote; and
(6) invites Congress to allocate the requisite funds for 
public service announcements on television, radio, newspapers, 
magazines, social media, billboards, buses, and other forms of 
media--
(A) to remind people in the United States when 
elections are being held;
(B) to share important registration deadlines; and
(C) to urge people to get out and vote.
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