A few weeks ago, John Kavanagh, a Republican legislator who chairs Arizona’s Government and Elections Committee, made waves when he said voting really shouldn’t be for everyone.
“There’s a fundamental difference between Democrats and Republicans,” he told CNN. “Democrats value as many people as possible voting, and they’re willing to risk fraud. Republicans are more concerned about fraud, so we don’t mind putting security measures in that won’t let everybody vote — but everybody shouldn’t be voting … Not everybody wants to vote, and if somebody is uninterested in voting, that probably means that they’re totally uninformed on the issues. Quantity is important, but we have to look at the quality of votes, as well.”
Kavanagh may be onto something …“everybody shouldn’t be voting.” He’s right, but for the wrong reason.
We should want fewer people voting not because that would reduce fraud, but we should want to reduce the number of uninformed citizens from voting!
I have long been in favor of some type of national civics test before allowing someone to exercise his or her right to vote. Just like potential drivers first have to demonstrate they know the rules of the road by passing a written test, so should citizens show their knowledge of American history and our political system before being allowed to vote.
As David Harsanyi wrote in the Washington Post a few years back, “By weeding out millions of irresponsible voters who can’t be bothered to learn the rudimentary workings of the Constitution, or their preferred candidate’s proposals or even their history, we may be able to mitigate the recklessness of the electorate.” He added, “If you have no clue what the hell is going on, you also have a civic duty to avoid subjecting the rest of us to your ignorance.”
Of course, this will never happen!
A test to weed out ignorant voters would, no doubt, run up against calls of governmental bias in setting up such a test in the first place. And, anyway, too many politicians depend on clueless voters to wield and secure their power.
Perhaps the best we can hope for is that the uninformed, the misinformed and the disinformed will someday want to brush up on their civics or just voluntarily abstain from voting.
Unfortunately, that’s highly unlikely.
We may forever be stuck with bad governance and an American populace where only 40% can pass a basic multiple choice U.S. citizenship exam.
Photo | abcnews.go.com
