Which amendment to the U.S. Constitution abolished poll taxes in federal elections in 1964?

The Twenty-fourth Amendment abolished poll taxes in federal elections in 1964.

Poll taxes required people to pay a fee before voting. In several Southern states, the charges were used with literacy tests, intimidation, and registration barriers to suppress Black voters and poor white voters. The Twenty-fourth Amendment prohibited poll taxes in federal elections, including elections for president, vice president, senators, and representatives.

Congress proposed the amendment in 1962, and it was ratified on January 23, 1964. Five states still had poll taxes at the time: Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia.

The Supreme Court later ruled in Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections, in 1966, that poll taxes in state elections also violated the Equal Protection Clause. The amendment therefore formed part of a broader constitutional and legal attack on financial barriers to voting.