We have long called for the voting rights of felons to be restored automatically once they have served their time.

Today, we renew our call for Virginia to drop the shackles of Jim Crow that continue to disenfranchise men and women who have completed their sentences and finished all supervised probation and parole.

This restriction wrongfully bars people from fully participating in the democratic process once they have done their time and returned to live, work and pay taxes alongside others Virginians.

Unless they jump through hoops to seek restoration of their rights from the governor, they continue to be punished by a loss of their civil rights. They cannot vote, cannot serve on a jury or run for and hold elective office.

This branding and banishment from full participation in society continues to fall disproportionately on Black and brown people who are locked up at a much higher rate than their white counterparts.

We believe once a felon has completed his or her time and finished all active supervision, he or she automatically should be allowed to vote.

It will take a change in the Virginia Constitution to make that happen, which won’t be easy. But we applaud Delegate Charniele Herring of Northern Virginia, a member of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus and the first woman and first African-American to become majority leader in the House of Delegates, for spearheading the effort toward change.

Until former Gov. Terry McAuliffe had the guts in 2016 to streamline the process and restore the constitutional rights of more than 173,000 Virginians, this state continued to labor under Constitutional provisions from 1902 that were designed to disenfranchise as many African-Americans as possible.

When Gov. McAuliffe acted, an estimated one in five African-Americans in Virginia was unable to vote because of felony convictions. That’s 20 percent of the state’s Black population.

Virginia is one of just 11 states that permanently disenfranchises people with felonies unless the governor authorizes that restoration. And while we don’t have figures, we expect that the automatic restoration of rights would impact thousands of Virginians.

We urge members of the General Assembly to adopt Delegate Herring’s House Joint Resolution 555 to allow automatic restoration of voting rights for felons.

To change the Constitution, the resolution must be passed by two consecutive legislative sessions and then approved by Virginia voters in a referendum.

Delegate Herring’s resolution starts that process.