What are the reasons that americans have to register to be eligible to vote? For me it doesn’t seem to serve a purpose. And why are people convicted of crimes not allowed to vote? How serious of an offence must a person be guilty of to lose his right to vote? IMHO it’s an irrevocable human right to vote no matter what you have done.
People need to register to vote because you need to declare where you live in order to vote for the correct Congressman, state & local representatives, Senator, and for the electoral vote for president.
Regarding the criminal thing, (WAG alert!) I assume that we take away their right to vote because they’d vote for what’s in the best interests of criminals such as themselves…something that can’t possibly be good for society.
And one more thing: no human right is “irrevocable.” Even the right to life, which is described in the Declaration of Independence as being “inalienable,” can be revoked through due process of law, according to the Constitution.
Chaim Mattis Keller
You have to register to minimize the possibility of widespread fraud in elections (and that’s happened at times, anyway). You have to show you really exist and meet the qualifications (citizen over 18, not a convicted felon) - why is that so hard?
The philosophy behind banning felons from voting, as I understand it, as that an act of attack against society, that demonstrates lack of respect for society, should prevent one from taking a part in directing that society. You don’t have to agree, but that’s the concept.
Personally, I object to the permanence of the voting ban for felons in the US - completion of a sentence or probation should be enough to restore one to good standing. Maybe it’s different in other countries?
we register to vote, in part so that on election day, we (all of us) can collectively be assured that we’re voting in the correct district.
the election workers have our names /addresses, facimile of our signature available to check (at least in my area)
One person, one vote. It also hopefully (but not completely) fixes the posibility of some one registering in different districts.
RE: felons. The laws vary. in some states one ‘merely’ looses the right to vote while one is incarcerated. Other jurisdictions restrict it to those who’re off supervision (parole and the like) and still others permanently. I have no idea how they regulate this. I’ve never been asked about a felony when I’ve registered to vote.
WAG’s : The “why”, well, let’s see, there’s the “you’ve harmed society and we’re going to take away rights of yours” thought process, there’s the logistics of having a polling place IN the prison/jail (and we REALLY don’t want to give day passes out for this), as well as, I imagine some one thought “gee they fight about all sorts of stupid stuff in here already, why give them yet another topic?”
The details of registering to vote vary from state to state. In Wisconsin, registering to vote involved nothing more than bringing current proof of address to the polling place. I registered to vote about 2 minutes prior to voting, at 7:30 PM on election day. The rules vary from state to state, but I think that this sort of instant registration is best.
Here’s a mailbag article: Why Can’t Felons Vote?
Cmkeller: I ment “irrevocable” in a philosophical way…
ElvisL1ves: But you must have people registered at city hall in the town where they live. Here in Sweden you get a letter home with an adress where to go to vote and there they check your id and match it with a list they have at that place. Requiring people to vote seems to just make an extra step in the way for people which is unneccesary when so many people choose not to take part in an election.
Friedo: Thanks, forgot to check mailbag…
I don’t think the question was as much about why we need a list of eligible voters. If I may rephrase the OP (and Juggler, you should correct me if I’ve misconstrued you): Why are Americans required to register to vote when the government ostensibly already knows how old they are and where they live?
The need to register to vote is one of those peculiarly American things that we often seem to think of as universal.* Many countries, including the United States, have social insurance programs that track the age of their citizens. If not social insurance, the age and name of a citizen could be held by the draft board, the department of motor vehicles, the tax people, or whoever, yet Americans still have to tell the government, more or less, what they already know. And lacking a strong sense of comparative politics, we think it’s perfectly normal.
Granted, there is the thorny problem of the government not really knowing where you live. They’ll know after you file for taxes (nobody does this before age 18), or if you have a driver’s license (lots of people still don’t have one at 18); on the whole there are a lot of cracks your address could fall into before the election found you and sent your little precinct card.
The real reason we have to register is we haven’t gotten around to making the agencies do it for us. Americans are as apathetic about voter apathy as they are about politics. If you don’t vote, you sure as heck don’t care; if you do vote, you might not want to dilute your power by registering they guy up the block. It’s sad, I think, but true.
- Another one is partisan redistricting, where each political party tries to use the process of drawing election constituencies to your advantage. Redistricting in Britain is done by nonpartison Boundary Commissions, and gerrymandering is unknown. A lot of Americans with a small amount of political knowledge would find this scarcely believable, and would probably chalk it up to inexplicable differences between Britain and the US. This is all wrong, because one of the few ways in which the UK and the US are politically similar, is, both countries use single-member districts with a plurality rule (the British call it “first past the post” but don’t let it obscure the similarity).
This thread has reminded me of something I’ve always wondered about: Look for my new thread “Why do we vote for stupid things?” about why we elect the Drain Commisioner and other such ultra-obscure positions.