poll tax

[pohl]

noun

1. a capitation tax, the payment of which is sometimes a prerequisite to exercise the right of suffrage.

poll tax

noun

1. a tax levied per head of adult population

2. an informal name for (the former) community charge

poll tax

1. A tax required as a qualification for voting. After the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution extended the vote to blacks in 1870, many southern states instituted poll taxes to prevent blacks from voting. The Twenty-fourth Amendment to the Constitution, adopted in 1964, prohibits poll taxes for federal elections.

Word History and Origins

Origin of poll tax¹

First recorded in 1685–95

Example Sentences

Congress’s aim was to prevent minorities from being disenfranchised by the likes of poll taxes.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

The scale of the arrests - at a level not seen since the poll tax riots in the 1990s - and the diversion of police from other areas was criticised by MPs, including many from Labour.

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From poll taxes abolished by the 24th Amendment in 1964 to barriers dismantled by the Voting Rights Act of 1965, every step forward has been a fight against deliberate disenfranchisement.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

The poll taxes and literacy tests of that era operated under the idea that Black people were fundamentally unqualified to participate in democracy.

Read more on Salon

The role meant he was involved in introducing the poll tax in Scotland, where it was piloted a year earlier than in England and Wales.

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