By BRIAN MURPHY
EL NUEVO SOL

On Nov. 6, a plurality of about 123 million voting Americans said “Yes” to a second term for President Barack Obama. That’s a big number, but the overall vote total from that election didn’t reach that of the 2008 presidential election between Obama and Sen. John McCain. That race influenced a turnout of the voting-eligible population the United States had not seen in 40 years. It energized a nation. Well, about three-fifths of a nation.

The chart above was created with information posted by Dr. Michael McDonald, a government and politics professor at George Mason University. It shows that about 62 percent of the voting-eligible population (VEP) cast a ballot in the 2008 presidential election.

An encouraging sign is that percentage has gone up every four years since the 1996 election. However, that still leaves almost 40 percent of Americans unaccounted for. And, according to the Institute for Democratic and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), when compared to the turnout of registered voters during national elections in other established democracies, some notable countries dwarf the U.S.

History of Voter Turnout in The United States

The percentage of turnout set against a country’s voting-age population (VAP) is one way to examine voter turnout totals. That’s the method the U.S. Census Bureau uses. From 1860 through the turn into the 20th century, the percentage of voter turnout among those old enough to vote in the United States was consistently between 70 and 80 percent, sometimes higher, according to the American Presidency Project. But less than 70 percent of VAP has voted in every major election after 1900. That drop can be attributed in part to the rising immigrant population in the U.S. and restrictions on who can and can’t vote.

“Even though the law changed after the Civil War for African-Americans, they were prohibited from voting in some places,” said University of Central Florida political science professor Dr. Roger Handberg. “They were technically eligible, but they weren’t allowed to vote. When you get to the female vote, there was a burst of energy there, but after an election or two, they began to vote at the rate of the male population.”

In 2001, McDonald and Samuel Popkin wrote that the narrative of low voter turnout in the United States was “an illusion.” The real cause, they wrote, was the nation’s growing population of those who were over the age of 18 but ineligible to vote — non-citizens and convicted felons — which caused the VAP total to increase. Their study states that the percentage of non-citizens among the voting-age population rose from 2 percent in 1966 to 8 percent in 2000. As for ineligible felons, their percentage among the VAP went up from 0.5 percent in 1982 to 1.4 percent in 2000.

Still, there are millions of eligible Americans who choose not to vote in major elections, and they have many reasons for staying away from the polls.

Why Don’t More People Vote?

During the 1990s, an average of only 44.9 percent of voting-age Americans voted in major elections, according to IDEA.

There are plenty of reasons why Americans choose not to vote. Karina Rivas, a youth volunteer for the Central Alameda Neighborhood Council, said simply that “Some people just don’t care.” But it’s not just apathy or cynicism that keeps people from using this civic right.

The electoral college, a fixture in this system of representative government, has led people to question the value of their vote since it has shown that the winner of a presidential election isn’t always the person who gets the most votes, as was the case in 2000 with George W. Bush and Al Gore.

“I think the electoral college is severely outdated, and it should be done away with,” said Dan Moreno, member of the Marina Del Rey Neighborhood Council. “It should be certainly a popular vote.”

Unfamiliarity with the system and lack of voter education can also lead to more people abstaining from voting. Rita Ortiz, a 27-year-old homemaker in California, has parents who were born in Mexico, but she and three of her siblings were born in the U.S. They are all eligible to vote, but she says they choose not to because the importance of voting was never stressed in their household.

“Maybe if my parents were somehow allowed to be a part of the elections, then they can teach us to be more involved, especially since they have four children that were born here,” Ortiz said. “That’s four votes — If they actually matter. Don’t get me wrong; my father encouraged me to vote once I turned 18, but I left home and I was my own teacher from that moment on.”

Dr. Tom Hogen-Esch, a political science professor at California State University, Northridge, said some of the parents who immigrated to the United States may not teach their children about politics because they arrived here from countries with dangerous governments where you voted at your own peril.

“When you come to the new country, you’re not sure how things work and you’re not sure you want to get involved in something that in the old country could have gotten you killed,” Hogen-Esch said.

Plus, there’s the age-old question of “Does my voice count?” Hogen-Esch says it’s hard to convince yourself that it does when the math just doesn’t add up.

“If you live in California and you’re voting for president, your one vote literally does not count. I mean, if Obama is going to win California by 15 to 20 points, what’s the point?

“What’s the chance that the election comes down to one vote? Even if you lived in Florida in 2000, what’s the chance that your one vote would have swung the election?”

Handberg also pointed to onerous voter registration laws, voter fatigue caused by a long slate of seemingly never-ending election cycles and inconvenient voting dates as other reasons why people don’t vote.

“If I had a choice of giving up four hours of pay to vote (on a Tuesday), I’m not going to do it,” Handberg said. “That’s just reality.”

Why is Voting Important?

Dr. Alexandra Cole, a political science professor at CSUN, said voting is more than just wanting to have a say. She said voting confirms one’s commitment to democracy.

“You know how they say that if you’re unhappy you should smile, because by smiling you become happier by doing it? It’s sort of the same view of voting. You might not think that your vote matters, and it might not matter in a very objective sense, but subjectively you are owning the system, and it makes the system better.”

While many avoided the polls, many others looked past the inconveniences so that they could get a chance to pick whom they wanted to lead the United States for the next four years. There were long lines and voting complications. Some people took time off from work, but to them, the right to vote is a special privilege

“If you want to exercise your right for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, you have to vote,” said Dr. Priscilla Reed, election chair of the ECCAN Development Council.”The only way you will count is if you get out and do it. If you don’t vote, you don’t count, you can’t say anything when somebody does something you don’t want to do. So to be able to vote in today’s time is as important as it is to drink water and breathe air.”

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