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1995 SESSION
Proposing amendments to Section 1 and Section 2 of Article II of the Constitution of Virginia, relating to franchise.
RESOLVED by the House of Delegates, the Senate concurring, a majority of the members elected to each house agreeing, That the following amendments to the Constitution of Virginia be, and the same hereby are, proposed and referred to the General Assembly at its first regular session held after the next general election of members of the House of Delegates for its concurrence in conformity with the provisions of Section 1 of Article XII of the Constitution of Virginia, namely:
Amend Section 1 and Section 2 of Article II of the Constitution of Virginia as follows:
Section 1. Qualifications of voters.
In elections by the people, the qualifications of voters shall be as follows: Each voter shall be a citizen of the United States, shall be eighteen years of age, shall fulfill the residence requirements set forth in this section, and shall be registered to vote pursuant to this article. No person who has been convicted of a felony shall be qualified to vote unless his civil rights have been restored by the Governor or other appropriate authority. As prescribed by law, no person adjudicated to be mentally incompetent shall be qualified to vote until his competency has been reestablished.
The residence requirements shall be that each voter shall be a resident of
the Commonwealth and of the precinct where he votes. A person who is
qualified to vote except for having moved his residence from one precinct to
another may in the following November general election and in any intervening
election vote in the precinct from which he has moved. Residence, for all
purposes of qualification to vote, requires both domicile and a place of
abode. The General Assembly may provide for persons who are qualified to
vote except for having moved their residence from one precinct to another
within the Commonwealth to continue to vote in a former precinct subject to
conditions and time limits defined by law. The General Assembly may
also provide, in elections for President and Vice-President of the
United States, alternatives to registration for new residents of the
Commonwealth.
Any person who will be qualified with respect to age to vote at the next general election shall be permitted to register in advance and also to vote in any intervening primary or special election.
Section 2. Registration of voters.
The General Assembly shall provide by law for the registration of all persons otherwise qualified to vote who have met the residence requirements contained in this article, and shall ensure that the opportunity to register is made available. Registrations accomplished prior to the effective date of this section shall be effective hereunder. The registration records shall not be closed to new or transferred registrations more than thirty days before the election in which they are to be used.
Applications to register shall require the applicant to provide the following
information on a standard form: full name, including the maiden and any
other prior legal name; age; date and place of birth; residence
address; social security number, if any; whether the applicant is
presently a United States citizen; address and place of abode and date of
residence in the precinct; place of any previous registrations to vote; and
whether the applicant has ever been adjudicated to be mentally incompetent or
convicted of a felony, and if so, under what circumstances the applicant's
right to vote has been restored and such additional information as may
be required by law . All applications to register shall be completed by
or at the direction of the applicant and signed by the applicant, unless
physically disabled. No fee shall be charged to the applicant incident to an
application to register.
Nothing in this article shall preclude the General Assembly from requiring as a prerequisite to registration to vote the ability of the applicant to read and complete in his own handwriting the application to register.