A.P.

Civics Notes: Chapter 6

“Political Participation”
I. A Closer Look at Nonvoting
1. Only half of Americans vote, and many people blame this on apathy and urge the
gov’t to turn up campaigns to urge people to vote, but this is an incorrect description
of the problem, and the solution does not help matters either.
2. When a list of the percentage of the voting-age population goes out to vote, America
ranks near last, but if the percentage is of registered voters who vote in elections, the
U.S. is in the middle of the pack.
3. Apathy is not the solution to why America has such a low voter turnout rate because
of the people who are registered voters, a large percentage (well over 80%) do vote.
i. The problem is that a low percentage (comparatively to other nations) of U.S.
adults are actually registered to vote.
4. In America, the burden to register to vote falls on the people, and the registration
process can often be too much of a hassle for people to go through; in European
countries, most citizens are automatically registered when they are old enough to vote.
i. In 1993, Congress passed the motor-voter bill, which required states to allow
people to register to vote when applying for driver’s licenses and provide
registration through the mail.
a. This program seems to have encouraged many people to register.
5. Voting is not the only way to participate in politics; joining civic associations,
supporting social movements, writing to legislators, and fighting city hall are also
forms of political participation.
i. If one uses that to measure political participation, then Americans possible
participate more than members of any other country!
ii. Also, if fewer people actually register and vote, it could mean that people are
satisfied with things the way they are, but voting is still important.
II. The Rise of the American Electorate
1. Ironically, it was America were large numbers of people were first allowed to vote.
i. When the Constitution was framed, voting was limited to property owners of
taxpayers, but by the time Andrew Jackson became prez, voting was available
to all white males.
ii. Blacks gained the right to vote after the Civil War; women won suffrage in
1920; today, being in prison bars a person from voting.
2. The Constitution initially permitted the states to decide who could vote for what, and
in the early days, different states ran their elections and their voting processes in
widely varied ways.
i. Some picked their House members statewide, rather than by district, while
others used districts but still elected more than one member per district.
ii. Presidential electors were first picked by state legislatures, rather than by the
people directly.
iii. In 1842, a federal law required that all House members be elected by districts.
3. The 15th Amendment supposedly gave Blacks the right to vote, but not technically.
 i. Racists used different stratagems, like the literacy test (one must be able to
read to vote; most Blacks were illiterate), the poll tax (pay to vote; most
former slaves were poor), and the grandfather clause (one could vote if
his/her ancestors voted before 1867; Blacks couldn’t vote before 1867 because
they were slaves).
ii. Gradually, the Supreme Court overturned most of these “catches,” allowing
minorities to vote.
4. In 1965, the passage of the Voting Rights Act suspended the use of literacy tests and
authorized the appointment of federal examiners who could register Blacks in [mostly
Southern] states where less than 50% of the voting-age population had voted or
registered in the last presidential election.
i. Afterwards, the number of Black voters shot up drastically.
5. The 19th Amendment gave women suffrage after decades of fight and protest.
6. The Voting Rights Act of 1970 gave 18 year-olds the right to vote beginning January
1, 1971, but was declared unconstitutional; the 26th Amendment later lowered the
minimum voting age to 18.
i. In 1961, the 23rd Amendment let Washington D.C. residents vote.
7. One would think that by letting so many more groups of people vote, that turnout
would skyrocket, but instead, the percentage of eligible Americans who’ve voted has
remained steady, and the number hasn’t come near the late 19th century levels of 70-
80%.
i. One view for this drop in turnout says that in the late 1800s, politicians worked
hard for people’s votes, but afterwards, the public got bored of constant
Republican landslides.
ii. Another view states that during the period where turnout rates were high, fraud
ruled the polls, since political parties, not the gov’t, printed the polls and a
person could vote more than once.
a. Bosses and political parties controlled the counting of votes, and often
padded the counts when they feared losing; in 1888, West Virginia had
a voter turnout of 108%!
b. Luckily, in 1890, states began using the Australian ballot, which was
government-printed and uniform in size and shape, to vote, and voting
was done privately, not publicly; thus, this cut back on but didn’t
eliminate fraud.
8. Voting rates probably have dropped, simply because it has become more difficult to
register to vote.
i. Of course, some drops and rises in voter turnout simply cannot be explained.
III. Who Participates in Politics?
1. Studies show that politics is not at the heart of day-to-day life, and many people even
misreport whether or not they vote, often saying they have when they have not
(according to Sidney Verba and Normal Lie).
i. Work, family, church, and other voluntary activities come first.
2. About one-fifth of Americans seem to be completely inactive: they rarely vote or take
part in politics; while about one-ninth of Americans are on the other end: these
activists are highly educated, are rich, and tend to participate in all forms of
government.
3. There are four groups that are between these extremes:
i. The voting specialists vote a lot but do little else and are older, poorer, and
less educated.
ii. The campaigners vote but also get involved in campaign activities and are
smarter.
iii. The communalists are much like campaigners in social background but are
most involved in community activities than partisan campaigns.
iv. The parochial participants don’t vote and stay out of campaigns and
community activities but are willing to contact local officials about problems.
4. More schooling and heavier religion tend to encourage people to vote more.
5. Richer white vote more than poorer Blacks, but if income and schooling between both
are the same, then Blacks actually vote more than Whites do.
6. So, why are less people voting? Probably because there are more young people and
more Blacks and other minorities, thus pushing down the percentage of Americans
who are registered and vote, despite the fact that the process of registration has
become a lot easier now than in the past.
i. Political parties aren’t as good as mobilizing voters anymore; those states
where voting registration is difficult still impede potential voters; voting is
costless (in Italy, nonvoters get the stamp “DID NOT VOTE” on their ID
papers, and in other nations, fines can be levied on nonvoters); and people
don’t feel that voting matters much any more (“How can one vote make a
difference in a huge election?”).
7. To solve this lack of voters, registration could be made automatic, but that could lead
to more voter fraud; and voting could be made mandatory, but Americans would most
certainly object to that.
8. Interestingly, Democrats usually think that higher turnouts will help them and
Republicans think that higher turnouts will hurt them, even though sometimes, the
opposite has occurred.
9. Americans may vote less than citizens of other countries, but they are participating
more, and public demonstrations such as sit-ins and protest marches have become
much more common than before.
i. Furthermore, Americans vote for more officials than people of other nations
(president, governor, senators, state representatives, city council, mayor,
school board members, etc…).
ii. In European countries, a person may only be able to vote one person every few
years.
10. Unfortunately, in America, due to the imbalance in voter turnout, many social groups
are underrepresented while others are over-represented; the ratio is not equal.
11. Obviously, what accounts for differences in political participation are not totally clear,
but one can get a general idea of why, and that alone helps.