Artist Insight: The right to vote was obtained by the sheer determination of an oppressed people to exercise their God given right. "1965" the year the Voting Rights Act passed. "3/5' represents the 1960 census defining African Americans as "3/5's human" The fact that both black and white hands are trying to stop him from voting, shows that some were content to go along to get along and would do anything to maintain the status quo. The American flag is faded because African Americans were brutalized and the government often participated in the brutality or looked the other way and let it happen. The comments on the image were written during a 2008 voter registration drive which ultimately helped to elect America's first African American president, Barack H. Obama.