Voting in America

A detailed Summary of Voting in America

Although every American citizen over 18 years of age is allowed to vote only about half of those turn out to vote on Election Day. For the last 50 years we have never had a higher percentage than 62.8 of eligible Americans voting. The percentage of voters tends to be between 60% and 50% during a presidential election year. Years when only Congressmen are being elected the percentages are even lower. It is very important for Americans to vote because those who are elected to office make the laws and decisions that affect the well being of our country. There are some historical, social, and economical issues throughout our past and today, however that explain why people don't vote.

After the creation of the Constitution, two factions arose. They were the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists. The Federalists were for the ratification of the proposed Constitution, because they thought the Articles of Confederation were weak and the new Republic would overcome the difficulties of the Articles of Confederation. The Anti-Federalist were opposed to the ratification of the Constitution because it didn't mention the States and their powers. Plus, it did not contain a Bill of Rights to protect the people. From these

two groups grew the parties we have today. The Federalists later became the current day Republicans. The Anti-Federalists lead, by Jefferson, formed the Democratic Republicans which later became known as the Democrats.

There are many factors that affect the way people vote. The first thing that affects a voter's views are their personal characteristics and the second is the voter's affiliations. The voter's income or amount of money earned per year; occupation, or job held effect their views. Education, grade school, high school, or college degree; a voters gender, male or female; their age, under 30, or between 30 and 49, or over 50; religious background, Catholic, or Jew, or Protestant; ethnic background or race, white or nonwhite; and geography, or region of residence, like North, South, East or West, are all a voter's personal characteristics. Your family, co-workers or friends, are the voter's affiliations. People over 50 usually vote Republican, while nonwhites usually vote Democratic. This does not hold true for all people over 50 and nonwhites because someone could be over 50 and nonwhite. All of these factors contribute to a person's political affiliation, but no one factor decides exactly how someone will vote. Psychological factors have to do with people's individual behavior. Party identification, candidates, or issues of the candidates are all psychological factors. All of these can effect how someone might vote.

Through the history of America not everyone has been able to vote. The electorate, or people eligible to vote, has changed many times. People should have the right to vote because our government is a democracy and gets its power from us through the idea of popular sovereignty. However, people need to be governed. Thi

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Approximate Word count = 1185
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Politics