The US has one of the lowest voter turnouts compared to other developed democracies. Historic patterns of voter apathy and systematic disenfranchisement of some voters is compounded by fears of electoral interference by outside parties. Will American voters and the government act to revitalize their democracy?
After two years of seemingly nonstop op-eds, initiatives, and public service announcements regarding the importance of voting, Americans are finally approaching the first big assessment of efforts to bolster democratic involvement during the Trump presidency: the 2018 midterm elections. Regardless of the color of the wave that arrives on November 6, one outcome is frustratingly likely: most eligible Americans probably won’t vote.
The non-voter issue, previously labeled a characteristic of apathetic American culture, has become, in the eyes of some commentators, a symptom of the decline of democracy. In America, about 40 percent of eligible voters turn out for the midterm elections, and even during presidential elections voter turnout has broken the 60 percent threshold only four times since 1932 (the most recent of which was 1968). This brings a daunting question to the table: do Americans stay home because they don’t think their vote counts, or because they don’t care if it counts?
Systematic suppression
A sizeable portion of Americans abstain from the democratic process – nearly 45 percent in 2016. If every eligible non-voter across the United States had written in a third name in 2016, that hypothetical candidate would have received 471 electoral votes and won the election in a landslide. Why do so many Americans not vote?
First, many people do not vote because there are substantial barriers to the ballot box. Recent examples of this are states like Ohio and Georgia purging voter rolls after a period of voting inactivity. In Georgia’s current gubernatorial race, the fact that a candidate currently serving as Georgia Secretary of State is stalling over 53,000 pending voter registrations has prompted conflict-of-interest accusations, a lawsuit, and calls for resignation.
These obstacles apply to a greater extent for African Americans than white voters, with polling places more often cited as “inconvenient” by black voters, and strict voting laws in states like North Carolina disproportionately affecting African Americans. Strict voting laws have been shown to have a relationship with low minority voting rates, with an average of a 5.4 percentage point decrease in voter turnout for Asian, Latino and African Americans in states with strict ID policies in elections from 2006-2014.
America’s voting issue also has roots in the prison system, as shown by the 3.1 million citizens who are ineligible to vote based on their status as felons. Combined with disproportionate rates of felony conviction — 33 percent of black men had such a conviction in 2010, compared to 13 percent of all adult men — it becomes easy to see racial inequality at the ballot box as a byproduct of the criminal justice system. Likewise, 34 states withhold voting rights from felons for some period of time after their sentences expire, if not indefinitely, effectively extending their punishment past its intended completion.
There remain issues that abridge a significant proportion of our population’s right to vote — but what about the American citizens who are both eligible and have access to voting rights?
Access, yet apathy
Despite there being many fewer systematic obstacles to voting for white Americans, they seem to voluntarily opt out of the democratic process, reinforcing the “apathy” narrative. According to the Census Bureau, white voters are five times more likely to cite “candidate or campaign issues” as a reason for not voting compared to black Americans. Likewise, in that same survey, only 66.7 percent of white Americans registered to vote, compared with 68.5 percent of black Americans. Voting rates reinforced this pattern, with 66.2 percent of black Americans completing their trip to the ballot box compared to 62.2 percent of white Americans.
This apathy spreads beyond racial categories, as data demonstrates that millennials have the lowest voting rate per eligible voter. While they now approach the Baby Boomer generation as the largest voting-eligible population in the United States (at about 62 million people in 2016), their turnout of 51 percent in 2016 falls about 12 percentage points below that of the next most active generation.
However, while many have chosen to assign the youngest voters with a hefty share of criticism for lack of civic participation, low voting rates for new voters have been a staple of American culture for decades, with a 50-year high of 50.4 percent of voters aged 18-24 turning out in 1964. The greatest change in voter turnout, meanwhile, comes from those aged 25-44, which dropped by over 20 percent since 1964. Those who are beginning careers, starting families, and making major life decisions seem to push civic obligations to the side, at the cost of their peers.
Domestic solutions
Other countries have pushed a number of policies to bolster election turnout, from making election day a national holiday to passing compulsory voting laws, which penalizes citizens who do not vote. Eleven democratic countries have implemented compulsory voting policies, and there is a 7.37 percent difference in voter turnout between all countries with compulsory voting and those without. However, the “stick” incentives that come with these policies globally range from fines, to imprisonment, to even suspension of civil rights in some countries, which could easily exacerbate the voter-turnout issue.
While the United States stands with the majority of democratic countries that make voting voluntary, it simultaneously remains in the minority of countries that hold general elections on a non-holiday weekday. The history of the Tuesday after the first Monday has its roots in 1845, when it was the perfect distance between the Sabbath and market day, and only adult white men could cast ballots.
This anachronistic choice doesn’t hold up in the modern day, especially as more Americans (especially working Americans) take on weekday obligations that make reaching the polls more difficult. Belgium, Sweden, South Korea, and France, all of which hold elections on Sundays or national holidays, boasted turnouts of 87.2, 82.6, 77.9, and 67.9 percent, respectively, in their most recent elections.
As if all of these patterns that constrict our democratic processes were not enough, the increasing threats of foreign interference in our elections — and the consistent failure to adapt to these threats — may also create a threat to voter turnout.
As worries of Russian and Chinese influence and interference grow, Americans’ “confidence” in the validity of election results finds itself around 66 percent, a statistic that has generally declined since 2000, particularly amongst Democrats. This is exacerbated by factors like a federal judge’s ruling on Georgia’s vulnerable electronic voting machines. Even efforts to mitigate this fear, like federal grants, may be insufficient to both protect voter registration databases and voting machines.
Our fears of hacking and insecure elections damage and delegitimize our democratic processes, as worries of challenged elections become tangible and echoes of controversial election rulings inspire new worries in our institutions.
Conclusion
There are three simultaneous flaws in the voting process: one of inequality, one of indifference, one of interference. In order to repair, reinforce, and simply sustain the democratic process at the core of American beliefs, government action is needed to solidify election security, establish an electoral holiday, and improve our voter registration methods. Democracy is broken when government allows it to be manipulated by outside parties or refuse participation to its citizens; it fails when citizens have access and security and choose to sit back and ignore our civic duties.
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Photo via Flicker/Tim O’Brien
Jack hails from Cleveland, Ohio, and graduated Magna Cum Laude from Miami University with a BA in English Literature and Media & Culture, where he reestablished a fraternity and ran a film production organization. Jack hopes to utilize his graduate education to help get responsible, intelligent people elected to positions where they can make positive change in their communities.