You Call This Democracy? by Elizabeth Rusch

Author:Elizabeth Rusch
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins

WHO CAN LOWER THE VOTING AGE?

Efforts to lower voting ages have been locally or state focused. In thirteen states and Washington, D.C., advocates can work directly with their towns or cities to lower the voting age for any type of election through something called a charter amendment. Basically, the local governing body has to amend the current rules to lower the voting age. No other effort would be required.

In the other states, advocates need to either change state law or get approval from the state legislature for a local change. So the first step is deciding at what level—state or local—to make the change and who has the power to implement it.

Whether working for local or state-level change, chances are good that advocates will need to educate the public and politicians and rally support. This might entail recruiting friends, neighbors, family members, and classmates; writing letters to the editor; making a website about the initiative and arguments in support of it; creating a social media campaign; gathering signatures for a petition; setting up meetings with school board members, town or city council members, or state legislators; and preparing and giving speeches.

Research, data, and passion can help convince people. But so can the equity principle: Is it fair to hold citizens age sixteen and seventeen to a higher standard than current voters? When the town council in Hyattsville, Maryland, considered lowering the local voting age to sixteen, one council member joked: “I’d like you to add an amendment . . . for a ‘Clean Your Room’ precondition before you grant the franchise.” Everyone laughed.

But the measure passed without amendment.

Perhaps the time has come to welcome the rest of the 8 million sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds fully into our democracy—whether their rooms are clean or not.

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