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Should citizens be required to vote? Local eighth-graders say yes
Civic involvement at the individual level is a cornerstone of a healthy, functioning democracy.
Yet when approximately two-thirds of the voting-eligible population turned out nationwide for the 2020 presidential election, it was a high-water mark for a national election in recent decades, with turnout often hovering around 50 percent, particularly in non-presidential years.
With this in mind, the League of Women Voters of Greencastle posed the following question to area eighth-graders during the return of Reality Fair Monday at the Putnam County Fairgrounds:
In many countries, it is a requirement to vote. Do you think it should be mandatory (required) in the U.S.?
By a combined count of 201-141, a 58-percent majority, participating eighth-graders from Cloverdale, Greencastle, North Putnam, South Putnam and Eminence said they believed, yes, voting should be a requirement.
Looking at the schools individually, only North Putnam, by a count of 47-37 (56 percent) in favor of not requiring voting, ran in opposition to the overall majority.
Among the other schools, the vote counts ran 31-26 (54 percent) at Cloverdale, 70-39 (62 percent) at Greencastle, 50-31 (62 percent) at South Putnam and 13-1 (93 percent) at Eminence — all in favor of mandatory voting.
What’s especially ironic, considering the subject matter, is that according to student counts provided by the schools prior to the event, voter turnout ran at 84 percent. South Putnam was they highest at 91 percent, followed by Cloverdale (90) North Putnam (85), Greencastle (78) and Eminence (64)
The participation numbers were based on expected students, not those in attendance Monday, so it’s unclear how much absences during the height of seasonal illnesses may have contributed.
