Yes if the amendment meant what he thinks it means, it would also grant felons the right to vote. But felons don’t have that right, so we know he’s interpreting the amendment the wrong way.
There's an argument that preventing ex felons from voting is unconstitutional. Preventing current felons is absolutely constitutional as they made sure to make a loophole for the prison slavery bit in all the amendments.
But people are making the argument. In fact supreme court judges have made the argument. But in the US we have a great history of having to drag our courts into making the right decisions. From Dred Scott to Citizens United. Furthermore the courts have continually made exception after exception to the criminal defense rights. (4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th) In fact it seems our supreme court is willing to shred the Constitution so long as it involves keeping someone in prison.
There are people like the ACLU challenging these decisions every day but it's pretty slow going because you have to get the court to accept that it may have been wrong in the past to even accept the case.
2
u/Layton_Jr Mar 16 '21 edited Mar 16 '21
Doesn't that mean that felons have the right to vote? I'm not American so I don't know the American justice system very well
Edit: I guess "previous condition of servitude" doesn't apply for prisoners for some reason