Misleading civics lesson

The Spokesman-Review’s March 21st Community Project civics lesson was disappointing. Stating that the 14th Amendment “says voters must be 21 and male” is blatantly inaccurate, and grievously misleading. That amendment actually says that states must allow all 21-year-old male citizens to vote, with the exception of criminals and rebels. It doesn’t exclude female citizens, or citizens of any age from voting as the article’s statement deductively states.

This folly was repeated when the article said that the 15th Amendment did not change the “requirement that [voters] be men at least 21.” There never was such a Federal Constitution requirement.

The article’s bold topic heading “Beyond white men” falsely inferred that non-Caucasian men did or could not vote in the U.S. - also an implied constitutional fault.

Although the article’s overview of state voter requirements and restrictions was somewhat interesting and informative, they were unfairly general, and there was no obvious relationship to the citizenship test question, which only referred to the Federal Constitution. To have initially described the relevant voting amendments, then explained why they were considered necessary would have been clearer.

By the misleading start, it seems that the citizenship question was only a vehicle to reinforce criticisms of our country and culture that soften the public’s minds to accept totally unrestricted, and unverifiable voting.

If the article had been news, it could be correctly called fake news. Since it wasn’t news, it is journalistic bias at best. As a longtime subscriber, that’s meant as constructive criticism.

Duncan Bean

Spokane Valley