Stop mass disenfranchisement

The clock is ticking on an upcoming date of huge significance for the future of our country…February 1, 2018, the deadline on submission of signatures for a proposed Florida state constitutional amendment to appear on the November, 2018 ballot. The amendment would restore the right to vote to 1.7 million persons, permanently disenfranchised as ex-felons. An estimated 20% of the state’s African-American population is now so barred.

The statute was put in place as a Jim Crow measure to do just that. Florida’s law is particularly egregious as many minor offenses were made felonies.

The group promoting the amendment, the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition badly needs assistance.

They failed to obtain enough signatures to get on the ballot in 2016 and news reports forecast them failing short once again this time.

We cannot allow that to happen.

— Stevan Goldin Gloucester, MA