# Tax delinquents can vote on taxes? Why? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 4, 2010, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-delinquents-can-vote-on-taxes-why/531226 "2010-03-04T02:01:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Perciful](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b38774/32.png) [@Perciful](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Perciful)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2010, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-delinquents-can-vote-on-taxes-why/531226/21 "2010-03-13T19:51:06Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > Many more states than those two allow felons who have served their terms to vote. And even in the others, there’s a system where a felon can be granted relief from the post-sentence penalties on demonstrating rehabilitation. Convicts – those presently imprisoned for felonies – are not permitted to vote. > > Finally, felonies are one class of crime – the most severe ones. Grand theft is a felony; shoplifting a pack of gum is not. Forcible rape or statutory rape – sex with a child – is a felony; making out with someone a month from age of consent, or making an unwanted pass, is not. > > In many states, driving with expired insurance or reckless speeding is as much a crime as trespassing on posted property or making harassing phone calls. Do you feel people should lose their vote permanently for any of these? People make mistakes and with the lower felonies like driving offenses or multiple drunk driving can turn their lives around and should be able to vote. It seems from the article that the government doesn’t have a system in place to keep track of the types of felony’s and if they can vote or not. What got me was how many felons do vote and it was quite a few. They actually have the power to swing a close election. ---
**Author:** ![Rumor\_Watkins](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d9b06d/32.png) [@Rumor\_Watkins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rumor_Watkins)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-delinquents-can-vote-on-taxes-why/531226/22 "2010-03-14T21:02:26Z")
It’s totally inefficient to single out a single group of “violators” and restrict their franchise to issues that are not related to whatever laws they violated Some states take the (imho, wrong) approach that violators of major crimes are no longer able to vote, period - this isn’t the same thing, though. you’re not selectively disenfranchising felons based on what they did to land them in prison - you’re just making a public policy statement that felons are, as part of their punishment, no longer allowed to be a voting member of society. so unless you’re prepared to do the same for all violators (so speeders, tax cheats, and murderers are all covered under this public policy rule), you’re going to have to come up with some other rationale to explain why tax cheats should be also uniformly disenfranchised. I would suggest that, as a matter of pragmatism, the number of tax cheats may either a) be so low that disenfranchising them will have no effect on voting decisions or b) be so high that you’re going to very quickly run into the aforementioned cost problems of singling out which taxes they’re skirting and which issues they are consequently not allowed to vote on. ---
**Author:** ![waterj2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/858c86/32.png) [@waterj2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/waterj2)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2010, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-delinquents-can-vote-on-taxes-why/531226/23 "2010-03-15T01:00:51Z")
> [@Perciful](#): > > It is because they came off the endangered species list. It used to be a crime to kill them. > > It isn’t a big enough crime to not pay your taxes to keep you from voting. But, just commit one armed robbery and forget voting again. Only 12 states do not allow felons to vote after completing their sentence and any parole or probation period. And of those 12, there are varying rules for having the right to vote restored that could allow someone with an armed robbery conviction to vote at some point. Here’s a state-by-state chart, with links: [Pros and Cons of Debate Topics | Britannica](http://felonvoting.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=000286) ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2010, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-delinquents-can-vote-on-taxes-why/531226/24 "2010-03-15T03:16:58Z")
> [@Perciful](#): > > It doesn’t make any sense to me. Isn’t it against the law for a felon to vote? A felon is a person that has broken the law. So if non payment of taxes is against the law why are we not suspending the rights of these people who are breaking the law, albeit it may not be a felony? Legally one doesn’t become a felon until after one’s been _tried and convicted_ in a court of law. So in order to disenfranchise tax delinquents it would first be necessary to arrest them, put them on trial, and then convict them. That takes time and resources. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-delinquents-can-vote-on-taxes-why/531226.md?page=1)