William O. Douglas

“ Our philosophy that removal of unwise laws must be left to the ballot, not to the courts, requires that recourse to the ballot not be restricted as New York has attempted. It little profits the Spanish-speaking people of New York that this literacy test can be changed by legislation either in Albany or in Washington, D.C., if they are barred from participating in the process of selecting those legislatures. ”

“ Appellant is an American of Spanish ancestry, literate in the Spanish language but illiterate in English and hence barred from voting by New York's statute.
I doubt that literacy is a wise prerequisite for exercise of the franchise. Literacy and intelligence are not synonymous. The experience of nations [1] like India, where illiterate persons have returned to office responsible governments over and again, emphasizes that the ability to read and write is not necessary for an intelligent use of the ballot. ”

“ New York, as I have said, registers those who have completed six years of school in a classroom where English is the medium of instruction and those who pass an English literacy test. In my view, there is no rational basis-considering the importance of the right at stake-for denying those with equivalent qualifications except that the language is Spanish. ”