Choose Not to Vote at Your Own Peril

Almost 2,400 years ago, Plato said in the Republic: “The penalty good men pay for being indifferent to civic affairs is to be ruled by evil men.”

In the early days, the right to vote in the United States was generally reserved for White male property owners 21 years old and older. It was then extended to males of all races in 1870, to White women in 1920, to eliminate racial discrimination in 1965, and to those who were as young as 18 in 1971.

I was one of thousands who personally campaigned for the last two efforts. As a Quaker, I got involved by being active in protests for civil rights and against the Vietnam War in the ’60s. I was a full-time activist and campaign manager for candidates of both parties at every level of government. I then spent the ’70s in the Pennsylvania state government as special assistant to the governor and as secretary of commerce.

I met and tried to work with Presidents Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Clinton, and Obama. I was a founding board member of C-SPAN, the nonpartisan cable TV channel carrying unedited government action live from the U.S. House and Senate to foster interest and knowledge of our country’s democratic process at work.

I’ve seen a lot of politics and government up close, and I can vouch for the importance of voting. Voting makes a difference. Elections make a difference. Consider the 2000 presidential Bush vs. Gore election. George W. Bush won by only one more vote than needed: 271 votes in the Electoral College.

We live in one of the oldest continuous democracies in the world. But many of us don’t vote. Based on 2020 data from the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, American voters ranked third from the bottom among the 37 democracies studied, having an average voter turnout of 56 percent for presidential elections. The top countries of Turkey, Belgium, Sweden, Denmark, and Australia averaged 76 to 89 percent.

Various studies have suggested why U.S. turnouts are lower: (1) lack of interest in candidates and issues; (2) thinking one vote doesn’t matter; and (3) inconvenient voting dates, places, and times.

Many countries with higher turnouts have voting on Sundays or holidays, automatic voter registration, and compulsory voting (enforced by the threat of fines).

We need to make it more convenient to register and vote in the United States. Yet, efforts are currently underway to make it more difficult. In September, the Brennan Center for Justice reported that in at least 29 states, voters this year will face new restrictions that were not in place in the 2020 presidential election.

It’s shocking to think, in all my 60-some years in politics and activism, that in the United States this year, nonpartisan election workers in some states are being equipped with panic buttons in case they are physically attacked on election day by partisan forces.

As one who has traveled widely and owned businesses in Communist countries, I think we Americans take a lot for granted—like living in a democracy with generous rights, freedoms, and opportunities. Recently we have seen the erosion of democracy around the world and, yes, even in our own country.

In her new book, Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World, Pulitzer Prize-winner Anne Applebaum addresses people who may have become cynical by watching the political process. “What the autocrats—whether they’re in American politics or in Russian politics or in Chinese politics—what they want is for you to be disengaged. They want you to drop out.” She goes on to say, “We’re going to have to defend and protect our political system if we want to keep it.”

So, what should we be doing?

There is an old Quaker adage about a man who visited a Quaker silent worship service for the first time. After five or ten minutes of silence, he leaned over and asked the Quaker next to him, “When does the service begin?” The person answered, “As soon as the worship ends.”

Quakers, like most religions, believe one’s religious and civic lives should be seamless, that we have a moral duty to ensure that people of all religions—or none—can practice as they wish; have economic opportunities; and enjoy the freedom to work on issues like poverty, education, healthcare, and equal rights for all.

I paraphrase Plato again: “If you choose not to be involved in civic affairs, you do so at your own peril by letting those with different priorities decide what rights and freedoms you and others will have.”

President Franklin D. Roosevelt said it bluntly as well: “Nobody will ever deprive the American people of the right to vote except the American people themselves and the only way they could do this is by not voting.”

So, vote.