1

Berkeley Urban

P. Gardner

Foxy 4 for 4’s

10/29/20

Compulsory Voting

Whether or not Compulsory Voting should be implemented into the United States laws

has been a big debate between the liberals and conservatives of the United States of America for

a long time. Compulsory voting is an idea of when the government requires you to vote for an

upcoming election so the country gets a lot more results and less idle citizens who don’t choose

to vote. People who are pushing for compulsory voting are on the more liberal side. The people

who are against it are seen on the conservative side of the spectrum. Some nations combatively

enforce the compulsion of voting, giving penalties and charging fees who violate such law. One

of these is Australia (Chief). Australia is also seen as a very successful country and they try to

push towards the idea of everyone being aware of who their candidates are. On the other side

there are many countries that are opposed to compulsory voting such as the United States of

America. Even with the opposition to the idea, the United States is still very successful in politics

and still manages to get fair votes for our candidates. Although what it all boils down to is the

question: Should the United States of America implement Mandatory voting. There are many

pros and cons to the situation that could be interpreted to know if it would be good or bad for our

country.

Compulsory has been a controversial topic in politics in this day and age, because the

political parties are extremely divided. Conservatives argue that one of the main reasons that
 2

they are against mandatory voting is because it violates our rights. “If voting is made mandatory

because people would not have the freedom to not express their opinion (Chief).” In other words

if we implement compulsory voting it would go against our first amendment right. On the other

side, if we allow compulsory voting we obviously get more people in on voting and we wouldn’t

have lower voter turnout. “It is not democracy if there is only 50 percent of voter turnout

(Chief).” If we make the voting mandatory we would get a huge voter turnout. Currently only a

small majority of the people in the U.S. vote every election. Doing this would get more of a

brimming result of who our president, mayor, governor, etc. would be.

If we make compulsory voting mandatory for the citizens in the United States we could

run into problems with voter interest. Making everyone vote in the United States would leave

lots of people who don't care about politics to vote. “This could push people to choose candidates

randomly, forfeiting the purpose of an election, which is to place deserving people in key

positions (Chief).” This could put a huge impact on the polls depending on whether or not people

know anything about the candidates. Even though if we allow imperative action on voting there

could be some positives if everyone participates in an election. If we don’t allow Compulsory

voting we would only have an educated group of people voting and if we pushed others to vote

we would get them to know more about what they are voting for (see fig. 1).
 3

(Fig. 1) Rice, I. (2011, December 8). Where Have all the Voters Gone? [Cartoon].

Retrieved October 20, 2020, from https://thetyee.ca/News/2011/12/08/Low-Voter-Turnout/

After extensive research on both sides of whether we should implement compulsory

voting into our society, I decided in my own mind that we should not change our current voting

system and keep it from violating our first amendment rights. If we were to force change, the law

on Mandatory voting would be very unconstitutional, and it would leave more innovation for

people who do not respect the constitution to try and change it. Doing this would make

everything extremely complicated and they would have to create punishment systems for those

who do not vote. “It would be a violation of fundamental rights to punish people who refuse to

practice their right to suffrage (Chief).” I prefer to stay on the side that ensures that every

citizen's rights are not being violated and that they have the freedom to choose if they want to

vote or not. It is best to let people stay comfortable and not to feel like they are being forced by

the government to do something.

After learning about both sides of the issue to Compulsory Voting, I learned that both

sides are very effective in getting fair elections. It is shown that allowing the new law would help
 4

voter turnout and other major things that might get more equitable polls. On the other hand

keeping away for mandatory voting would benefit us because it would help ensure our rights are

kept and nobody is being forced, or violated by the government to vote. Even though both sides

are tempting to take into consideration, it is best to stick with the side that ensures that everyone

in The United States has the freedom to choose if they want to vote or not, and aren’t being

punished for disobeying an order from the government.

WORKS CITED

Rice, I. (2011, December 8). Where Have all the Voters Gone? [Cartoon]. Retrieved October 20,

2020, from https://thetyee.ca/News/2011/12/08/Low-Voter-Turnout/

Carter, J. (2020, July 19). 3 reasons to oppose mandatory voting. Retrieved October 28, 2020,

from https://blog.acton.org/archives/76834-3-reasons-to-oppose-mandatory-voting.html

Chief, E. (2020, October 05). 13 Strongest Pros and Cons of Compulsory Voting. Retrieved

October 19, 2020, from https://connectusfund.org/13-strongest-pros-and-cons-of-compulsory-

voting

Liberty, Learn. “Should You be Forced to Vote.” Youtube, Nov. 1.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzTtsIf43WY