• Home
  • Opinion
  • Quizzes
  • Redistricting
  • Sections
  • About Us
  • Voting
  • Independent Voter News
  • Campaign Finance
  • Civic Ed
  • Directory
  • Election Dissection
  • Events
  • Fact Check
  • Glossary
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. turnout>

There's an urgent need to increase voter participation

Laura Merrifield Wilson
January 12, 2022
Virginia voter; low turnout

A Viriginia voter casts a ballot in November's election. Off-year turnout is especially low in the United States.

Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

Wilson is an associate professor of political science at the University of Indianapolis and a public voices fellow at The OpEd Project.

Senate action on voting legislation is stalled in 2021, even though governors across the country urged the U.S. Senate to pass the Freedom to Vote Act and the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. This postponement came at a time when voting rights are under siege in many cities and states, potentially blocking many who can vote from voting at all.

In a recent interview with CBS’ “Face The Nation,” Vice President Kamala Harris said, “And right now, we're about to take ourselves off the map as a role model, if we let people destroy one of the most important pillars of a democracy, which is free and fair elections.”

Recently New York City activists worked to give noncitizens the right to vote in local elections while Massachusetts is considering same-day voter registration. Meanwhile, the Justice Department recently announced its lawsuit against the state of Texas for violations of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

National questions involving voting seem more politicized and polarized.


The voting rights bill, named in memory of the late civil rights leader and long-serving representative from Georgia, proposes many reforms including requiring federal preclearance in changing certain electoral districts, limiting restrictive voter ID requirements, and adding requirements to changing voter roll maintenance or voting locations.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Ballot access has become a highly politicized topic in our country. Changing the rules of voting will inevitably influence changes in behavior. But just making it easier to vote does not mean people will be incentivized to do so. Perhaps getting younger Americans involved in the process will improve voting rates.

Previous legislation has made small improvements. The Help America Vote Act of 2002, the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, and the Voter Registration Act of 1965 marked increases, but none have ushered in a substantial wave of higher voter turnout.

To encourage people to vote, the voters themselves actually need to want to do so. Research demonstrates that early learning experiences as well as trust and understanding of the electoral system lead to greater voter interest. In this arena, the U.S. as a democracy falls behind other countries.

In the United States, voter turnout averages 55 percent to 60 percent in presidential election years and the numbers are far lower in off-year election cycles (53.4 percent in 2018 and 41.9 percent in 2014).

Interestingly, 2020 marked a record high, with 67 percent of voting-age-eligible citizens voting, according to the Census Bureau. While this increase warrants recognition, the reality is that it is still well below many democracies globally. Turkey and Sweden rank among the highest in voter turnout with 88.9 percent and 82 percent, while Switzerland (36 percent) and Luxembourg (48 percent) are among the lowest.

Other countries can boast of higher voter turnout but that may be a result of their institutional structures that incentivize or require it. Data from the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance shows 27 countries practice compulsory.

Even then, voter turnout reveals a decline in voter turnout in all countries over the last 70 years, though the numbers are still higher in those states that require voting compared to those that do not. More democracies hold elections on weekends or even declare them to be holidays, giving many workers the day off with plenty of time to cast their ballots.

And this is where the United States needs to step up, Vice President Harris said in the CBS interview: "I believe that voting rights is one of the most significant issues that is facing us as individuals and as leaders today, there's no question, no question. Voting rights lead to every other right, every other right. And so we need to prioritize it as a nation, all of us and understand why voting rights are important and- and- and insist that our elected leaders preserve these rights."

One way to get more voter involvement is getting students working the polls. Forty-five states have youth poll worker programs that allow adolescents as young as 15 to work directly in elections.

For example, Indiana offers the Hoosier Hall Pass Program through the secretary of state’s office, enabling 16- and 17-year-olds to serve as registered poll workers in elections.

Though this program has existed for nearly two decades, many students and school districts are not taking advantage of this unique opportunity to participate directly in democracy. In Indianapolis and Marion County, the state’s capital and largest urban area, 150 students served among the 4,000 poll workers employed during the general election.

Poll workers tend to be older; a Pew Research survey found a majority of poll workers are over 60 years old. This was especially concerning during the Covid-19 pandemic. Voter registration efforts, like Big-Ten-leading Purdue University, can likewise encourage participation among younger voters.

When the U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1788, only white men who owned property qualified to cast a ballot. Since then, numerous amendments and laws have enabled more Americans to participate, breaking down barriers of race, sex, ethnic ancestry, property ownership and age.

The requirements to vote now are fairly simple and straightforward: You must be an American citizen, at least 18 years old, and fulfill your state’s residency and registration requirements. In most states, you cannot be serving a felony conviction, but in Maine, Vermont, and Washington, D.C., felons never lose their right to vote.

The American election system would benefit from a serious reevaluation of the mechanisms that exist and the effects they have. Voting is so much more than an annual task, and empowering “pre-voters” through experiential learning can impart that sense of civic virtue that is necessary for a healthy democracy.

Perhaps then more Americans who can vote actually will vote.

From Your Site Articles
  • It's time to engage Americans who are not voters - The Fulcrum ›
  • Report: Student voters saw record-high turnout in 2020 - The Fulcrum ›
  • Texas' abortion ban could drive voter turnout in midterms - The ... ›
  • Timing is everything: Why 'off year' elections are a turnout buzz kill ... ›
  • Record voter turnout still brings concerns - The Fulcrum ›
  • Podcast: what can Black History Month teach us about the legacy & future of civil rights? - The Fulcrum ›
  • Three ways to change voting (or nonvoting) behavior - The Fulcrum ›
  • MN Gov. Walz asks Democrats to ‘Think Big’ to fix voting issues - The Fulcrum ›
  • Measuring the cost of neglecting the duty to vote - The Fulcrum ›
Related Articles Around the Web
  • Record High Turnout in 2020 General Election ›
  • Voter Turnout Database | International IDEA ›
  • In past elections, U.S. trailed most developed countries in voter turnout ›
  • Voter Turnout - Fairvote ›
turnout

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Confirm that you are not a bot.
×
Follow

Support Democracy Journalism; Join The Fulcrum

The Fulcrum daily platform is where insiders and outsiders to politics are informed, meet, talk, and act to repair our democracy and make it live and work in our everyday lives. Now more than ever our democracy needs a trustworthy outlet

Contribute
Contributors

To advance racial equity, policy makers must move away from the "Black and Brown" discourse

Julio A. Alicea

Policymakers must address worsening civil unrest post Roe

Sarah K. Burke

Video: How to salvage U.S. democracy from the "tyranny of the minority"

Our Staff

What "Progress" should look like, and what we get wrong

Damien De Pyle

The long kiss goodnight: Nancy Pelosi and the protracted decay of public office

Kevin Frazier

Demanding corporate responsibility for food system challenges

C.Anne Long
latest News

The show must go on

Amy Lockard
17h

Constitution Day conversation with Jamie Raskin: Preserving democracy today and tomorrow

Rick LaRue
Jamie Raskin
18h

Meet the Faces of Democracy: Stephen Richer

Michael Beckel
Ariana Rojas
20 September

The alchemy of laughter

Pedro Silva
20 September

Work/family balance should be a top tier policy area

Dave Anderson
20 September

Learning to make “the right call” in the right moments

Lisa Kay Solomon
19 September
Videos
Video: Expert baffled by Trump contradicting legal team

Video: Expert baffled by Trump contradicting legal team

Our Staff
Video: Do white leaders hinder black aspirations?

Video: Do white leaders hinder black aspirations?

Our Staff
Video: How to prepare for student loan repayments returning

Video: How to prepare for student loan repayments returning

Our Staff
Video: The history of Labor Day

Video: The history of Labor Day

Our Staff
Video: Trump allies begin to flip as prosecutions move forward

Video: Trump allies begin to flip as prosecutions move forward

Our Staff
Video Rewind: Trans-partisan practices and the "superpower of respect"

Video Rewind: Trans-partisan practices and the "superpower of respect"

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: How states hold fair elections

Our Staff
14 September

Podcast: The MAGA Bubble, Bidenonmics and Playing the Victim

Debilyn Molineaux
David Riordan
12 September

Podcast: Defending the founding principles of our government

Our Staff
07 September

Podcast: The continuing effects of summer heat and student loan repayments

Our Staff
05 September
Recommended
The show must go on

The show must go on

Big Picture
To advance racial equity, policy makers must move away from the "Black and Brown" discourse

To advance racial equity, policy makers must move away from the "Black and Brown" discourse

Big Picture
Constitution Day conversation with Jamie Raskin: Preserving democracy today and tomorrow

Constitution Day conversation with Jamie Raskin: Preserving democracy today and tomorrow

Big Picture
Meet the Faces of Democracy: Stephen Richer

Meet the Faces of Democracy: Stephen Richer

State
The alchemy of laughter

The alchemy of laughter

Comedy
Work/family balance should be a top tier policy area

Work/family balance should be a top tier policy area

Contributors