The Senate debate indicated that the children of law abiding civilized Indians in New York State were to be made citizens.
The Senate debate indicated that the children of Indians running amok out west were not to be made citizens.
Section 1 of the 14th Amendment was not merely for blacks.
The Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, also known as the Snyder Act, was proposed by Representative Homer P. Snyder (R) of New York and granted full U.S. citizenship to the indigenous peoples of the United States, called "Indians" in this Act. While the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution defines as citizens any persons born in the U.S. and subject to its jurisdiction, the amendment had been interpreted to not apply to Native people. The act was signed into law by President Calvin Coolidge on June 2, 1924. It was enacted partially in recognition of the thousands of Indians who served in the armed forces during World War I.
The privileges of citizenship, however, were largely governed by state law, and the right to vote was often denied to Native Americans in the early 20th century.
In 1948, the Arizona Supreme Court struck down a provision of its state constitution that kept Indians from voting. Other states eventually followed suit, concluding with New Mexico in 1962, the last state to enfranchise Native Americans.
Even with the lawful right to vote in every state, Native Americans suffered from the same mechanisms and strategies, such as poll taxes, literacy tests, fraud and intimidation, that kept African Americans from exercising that right. In 1965, with passage of the Voting Rights Act and subsequent legislation in 1970, 1975, and 1982, many other voting protections were reaffirmed and strengthened.