poll tax

Tax levied on every individual, without reference to income or property. Being simple to administer, it was among the earliest sorts of tax (introduced in England in 1379), but because of its indiscriminate nature (it is a regressive tax, in that it falls proportionately more heavily on poorer people) it has often proved unpopular.

In the USA, the tax was widely used as a means of disenfranchising poor blacks in southern states. It was made unconstitutional under the Twenty-Fourth Amendment (1964) for federal elections and in 1966 for state races.