Low Voter Turnout Essay

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The United States currently faces a severe problem with one of their governmental processes. In the democratic system of the United States, politicians are elected by voting from the citizens, in most cases. The problem the United States is facing is that people are no longer voting in elections for officials. This problem is discussed in the article, “In praise of low voter turnout”, written by Charles Krauthammer. The main idea behind this article is that voters are no longer interested in politics, as they were in previous generations. As the United States establishes itself as a superpower, the need for politics becomes less important to the citizens. Also, we are experiencing a shift in focus to developing more technology and building …show more content…

However, there are several ways to combat this problem. One way to get more voters to show up at the polls is have election officials mail ballots to all registered voters. This makes it easy for registered voters to select their candidates on their own time. This method to obtain more voters is in place in two states currently, Oregon and Washington. This method has proved effective because “in the 2010 midterm elections, just [Oregon and Washington] exceed 70 percent participation” (Koas). Another solution to the low voter turnout would be to allow citizens to cast their votes online. Although this is susceptible to fraud, they can limit the votes per person by only allowing one vote per IP address or by issuing each registered voter an account login. This method would allow people to cast their vote in a matter of minutes at their own time. The last suggestion that could increase voter turnout would be removing the registration process to vote. Younger voters are not familiar with the voting registration process or they think it is too complicated. This unfamiliarity and thought of the process being confusing deters the younger people from registering to vote in the first place. By removing this process, voters can just show up to cast their votes and move on with their day without worrying about this potentially confusing process. These three methods combined could increase the voter turnout for each