Split Thread Would Mandatory Voting improve the US political landscape?

Norman Alexander

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Norman Alexander
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Aridas said:
It is. The more they go crazy for the crazy base, of course, the more impetus that Independents and Democrats have to very firmly oppose them.

With that said, the pertinent warning is that whoever wins the Republican nomination will nigh inevitably have the force of the Republican riggers and propaganda machine behind them and are pretty much guaranteed to have a very real shot at winning the general election, no matter how insane or brazenly evil.
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Now think on this: What if voting was mandatory, and these percentages held. That way, that 100% of Americans would be polled, not those who can or could be bothered voting. Both Trump and DeSantis would get just 5% of the whole US vote, which would hardly be enough to win a coconut at a state fair. They would be far, far distant losers.

The Republicans are relying on gerrymandering and ensuring as few voters as possible in a voluntary voting system. So it becomes a game of playing the margins for them. Appeal to those marginals, the rednecks and raving MAGAs, and they can tip the results. This effectively gives this tiny sliver of the US population WAY more impact than they deserve.

But take that "advantage" away by polling everyone and these shysters are almost permanently out of the picture. The marginals have the electoral impact they always should have had - nothing.
 
Norman Alexander said:
Now think on this: What if voting was mandatory, and these percentages held. That way, that 100% of Americans would be polled, not those who can or could be bothered voting.
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Technically, as can be seen in this country (where we have had mandatory voting for a long time), up to about 95% of people would be polled, because there will always be a few informal votes. I think that if America suddenly introduced mandatory voting, the percentage of informal votes, or people who simply chose not to vote anyway, would be higher.
 
arthwollipot said:
Technically, as can be seen in this country (where we have had mandatory voting for a long time), up to about 95% of people would be polled, because there will always be a few informal votes. I think that if America suddenly introduced mandatory voting, the percentage of informal votes, or people who simply chose not to vote anyway, would be higher.
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I think you would get a lot of write in votes for Mickey Mouse.
 
Mandatory voting will not happen in the US anytime soon, if ever. For one thing, Republicans would be adamantly against it since there are about 10 million more registered Dems than Republicans.

According to World Population Review 2023:

The number of registered voters for the Republican Party is approximately 38.8 million.

The number of Democratic voters is reported to be around 49 million.
 
Norman Alexander said:
Now think on this: What if voting was mandatory, and these percentages held. That way, that 100% of Americans would be polled, not those who can or could be bothered voting. Both Trump and DeSantis would get just 5% of the whole US vote, which would hardly be enough to win a coconut at a state fair. They would be far, far distant losers.

The Republicans are relying on gerrymandering and ensuring as few voters as possible in a voluntary voting system. So it becomes a game of playing the margins for them. Appeal to those marginals, the rednecks and raving MAGAs, and they can tip the results. This effectively gives this tiny sliver of the US population WAY more impact than they deserve.

But take that "advantage" away by polling everyone and these shysters are almost permanently out of the picture. The marginals have the electoral impact they always should have had - nothing.
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Voting will not be mandatory in the US because of the simple fact that Republicans, as you say, are working to make it harder to vote so that fewer people vote. Mandatory voting would almost automatically kill the modern Republican party, as many prominent Republicans have openly said.
 
In the US, people are so often spiteful about being required to do something, even if it is sensible to do, that I'd worry that they'd mostly back a poor candidate or write-in a troll candidate instead of making an informed decision. A lot of the rest will pick based on name recognition or worse, whichever name "sounds" best to them. Which is to say that I think it will just add noise rather than make the results more representative.

I want it to be very easy to cast a legitimate vote. I also think it's a bad idea to drag (metaphorically) people to the booth that don't want to be there and haven't made an effort to become informed.
 
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arthwollipot said:
Technically, as can be seen in this country (where we have had mandatory voting for a long time), up to about 95% of people would be polled, because there will always be a few informal votes. I think that if America suddenly introduced mandatory voting, the percentage of informal votes, or people who simply chose not to vote anyway, would be higher.
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The USA of course will do the exact opposite of mandatory voting. Republicans will insure most Americans cannot vote. Hell, they had people with AR15s intimidating voters in Maricopa County.
 
arthwollipot said:
Those would be counted as informal. Write-in voting is a ridiculous concept in the first place and I don't know why it's even a thing.
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US Senator Lisa Murkowski begs to disagree.

After losing the 2010 Republican primary to Tea Party candidate Joe Miller, she ran as a write-in candidate and defeated both Miller and Democrat Scott McAdams in the general election.
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ETA: Ninja'd!
 
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Nosi said:
The USA of course will do the exact opposite of mandatory voting. Republicans will insure most Americans cannot vote. Hell, they had people with AR15s intimidating voters in Maricopa County.
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Voter suppression is something that can't happen under mandatory voting.

Trebuchet said:
URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisa_Murkowski"]US Senator Lisa Murkowski [/URL]begs to disagree.
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Disagree that it's ridiculous? What's to stop people voting for someone who in no way wants the job? Should that person then be forced to serve?
 
arthwollipot said:
Voter suppression is something that can't happen under mandatory voting.
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They'll just find a way to prevent the people they don't want voting from voting and impose draconian penalties on them for failing to vote.

"You can only vote at this one location, 90 minutes from where you live, during a specific three hour window, in the middle of the work day."
"You didn't vote? That will be a $2000 fine. Voting is mandatory, you know."
 
Armitage72 said:
They'll just find a way to prevent the people they don't want voting from voting and impose draconian penalties on them for failing to vote.

"You can only vote at this one location, 90 minutes from where you live, during a specific three hour window, in the middle of the work day."
"You didn't vote? That will be a $2000 fine. Voting is mandatory, you know."
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Nope. Done properly, they will be forced to make voting as easy as possible. For considerable detail, please see this thread:

NYT: What voting is like in Australia

Polling locations are plentiful, easy to get to, all day, on a weekend. This is what mandatory voting looks like.
 
And that's why mandatory voting will never happen or will not be done properly. The current goal is to make voting as difficult as possible to reduce the chance of the "wrong people" voting.
 
arthwollipot said:
Voter suppression is something that can't happen under mandatory voting.
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Yes it can.

Mandatory voting means that REGISTERED voters have to vote. Republicans would just have to pass laws to keep certain voters from getting registered in the first place... Blocking ex-felons from registering to vote, voter roll purges (that remove "suspicious" names that happen to be those that don't look "English"), make registration automatic for some (e.g. those with drivers licenses) but others must go through various hurdles to register.

And this assumes they don't still try to block registered voters who might vote Democrat with the idea that they will be "punished" (an extra bonus)


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arthwollipot said:
Bypassed by automatic registration of voters upon reaching adulthood.
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Perhaps it's worth noting that most of those here likely favor most measures up until just before actually making voting mandatory (which would likely fly like a lead balloon here in the US). Automatic registration and maintenance of the voter rolls, for example, would be (and automatic registration is, as of recently in some parts of the US) a huge positive step up. I'm personally a big fan of making decent information on every name on a ballot easily obtainable. Even while looking, I frequently have great difficulty for a number of state and local races, though.

It's also worth noting that most of those here are likely cynical that a lot of positive things that likely should have been implemented long ago and are currently being campaigned for anyways aren't likely to happen in many of the places that need them most for much the same reasons that they haven't happened already. The powerful forces in the US that actively work to take power away from the public and concentrate it in as few hands as possible while incentivizing those with the power to not relinquish it.

Lots of normally good things can be perverted by the shameless with selfish intent.

With all that said, this tangent has probably gone far enough in this thread?
 
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arthwollipot said:
Bypassed by automatic registration of voters upon reaching adulthood.
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On a main central federal database managed by a fiercely independent authority, the go-to authority and umpire on eligibility to vote. The same authority also manages the whole voting process, using consistent, safe and reliable methods.
 
Segnosaur said:
Yes it can.

Mandatory voting means that REGISTERED voters have to vote. Republicans would just have to pass laws to keep certain voters from getting registered in the first place... Blocking ex-felons from registering to vote, voter roll purges (that remove "suspicious" names that happen to be those that don't look "English"), make registration automatic for some (e.g. those with drivers licenses) but others must go through various hurdles to register.

And this assumes they don't still try to block registered voters who might vote Democrat with the idea that they will be "punished" (an extra bonus)


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Wait a minute, I changed my mind, I almost hope the US does move to mandatory voting for registered voters. People that lean Democrat won't generally mind, but conservatives will distribute PSA's on how to de-register so that the guvmint can't force you to vote if you don't want to. Then come viral memes of people bragging about how they deregistered to stick it to the liberals. Then when Republicans lose badly they will refuse to admit it's because they effectively embraced a campaign to NOT vote, and still say they would have won in a landslide if it weren't for Democrats cheating.
 
gnome said:
Wait a minute, I changed my mind, I almost hope the US does move to mandatory voting for registered voters. People that lean Democrat won't generally mind, but conservatives will distribute PSA's on how to de-register so that the guvmint can't force you to vote if you don't want to. Then come viral memes of people bragging about how they deregistered to stick it to the liberals. Then when Republicans lose badly they will refuse to admit it's because they effectively embraced a campaign to NOT vote, and still say they would have won in a landslide if it weren't for Democrats cheating.
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NOW you're catching on! :D
 
I have lots of stories from friends who lived in the former Soviet Union about mandatory voting. None of them are good.
 
Hercules56 said:
I have lots of stories from friends who lived in the former Soviet Union about mandatory voting. None of them are good.
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so?

It's not like voting was used for anything but claiming that there was high voter participation.
The actual voting was done by ballots stuffing.

Is your claim that mandatory voting automatically means ballot stuffing?
 
The Great Zaganza said:
so?

It's not like voting was used for anything but claiming that there was high voter participation.
The actual voting was done by ballots stuffing.

Is your claim that mandatory voting automatically means ballot stuffing?
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No, that mandatory voting and corruption seem to go hand in hand.
 
The Great Zaganza said:
Hercules56 said:
No, that mandatory voting and corruption seem to go hand in hand.
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You are accusing Australien elections to be corrupt?

I'm sure you have more than anecdotal evidence.
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The exemptions to mandatory voting in Australia make it look hardly "mandatory":

travel, illness, religious objection, seasonal workers, anyone without a fixed address, not registered to vote
 
I don't think mandatory voting is necessary. What is necessary is a modern and just voting system that is constitution-bound so different administrations cannot tamper with it to serve their own purposes. Then people will bother to vote.

Hans
 
Hercules56 said:
I have lots of stories from friends who lived in the former Soviet Union about mandatory voting. None of them are good.
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I think it basically immoral to make somebody who does not wnat vote vote, and I don't see what making somebody who does not care about politics vote does in the way of any good.
Now automatic voter registration is a good idea but complusoty voting..no.
 
dudalb said:
I think it basically immoral to make somebody who does not wnat vote vote, and I don't see what making somebody who does not care about politics vote does in the way of any good.
Now automatic voter registration is a good idea but complusoty voting..no.
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Agreed. Voting for our leaders and representatives should be an easy act to accomplish, but a choice we can refuse. Mandatory voting just smells so authoritarian to me.
 
Yes, mandatory voting has exceptions.

It generally takes more effort to get an exemption approved than it takes to just go vote.

So for those with legitimate reasons, it is there. For those who are just inclined to laziness, the path of least resistance is to go vote.

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dudalb said:
I think it basically immoral to make somebody who does not wnat vote vote, and I don't see what making somebody who does not care about politics vote does in the way of any good.
Now automatic voter registration is a good idea but complusoty voting..no.
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I agree.
 
Delphic Oracle said:
Yes, mandatory voting has exceptions.

It generally takes more effort to get an exemption approved than it takes to just go vote.

So for those with legitimate reasons, it is there. For those who are just inclined to laziness, the path of least resistance is to go vote.

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Welcome to Australia! Also, voting is always held on a Saturday, i.e. the weekend when work does not interfere. And it's usually at a local school with cake stalls and a barbie for school fundraising (Lions Club, etc.). So it's a social event, a nice day out.
 
MRC_Hans said:
I don't think mandatory voting is necessary. What is necessary is a modern and just voting system that is constitution-bound so different administrations cannot tamper with it to serve their own purposes. Then people will bother to vote.

Hans
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We need to end the electoral college, gerrymandering and go to a direct one-person, one-vote system. Get rid of the ridiculously long campaigning and private funding of campaigns. Politicians spend more time fund raising and campaigning than they do working.
 
Stacyhs said:
We need to end the electoral college, gerrymandering and go to a direct one-person, one-vote system. Get rid of the ridiculously long campaigning and private funding of campaigns. Politicians spend more time fund raising and campaigning than they do working.
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Have House members serve 4 years and not two.

Pass the John Lewis voting act. Then everything will be right with the world.
 
arthwollipot said:
That's right, because our democracy works and we voted out the people who were turning it that way at the last election.
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I'm growing more and more convinced that regality theory is correct, and that much of politics is simply manufacturing threats to trigger it.
 
dudalb said:
I think it basically immoral to make somebody who does not wnat vote vote, and I don't see what making somebody who does not care about politics vote does in the way of any good.
Now automatic voter registration is a good idea but complusoty voting..no.
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Democracy depends on voters making the effort to properly inform themselves about the people and policies they are voting for, rather than blindly swallowing whichever lies most appeal to them. People who do not have the time or inclination to do so should not be forced to vote.
 
Pixel42 said:
Democracy depends on voters making the effort to properly inform themselves about the people and policies they are voting for, rather than blindly swallowing whichever lies most appeal to them. People who do not have the time or inclination to do so should not be forced to vote.
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For many voters, these are the same thing.

Mandatory voting does not mean submitting a valid ballot. Also, you are not required to justify your vote to anyone, mandatory or voluntary. Whatever your reason for how you mark your ballot, the only person who you have to justify it to is you.

Also, it's not like there has been ongoing comparison of compulsory and voluntary voting in NSW: https://legalanswers.sl.nsw.gov.au/hot-topics-voting-and-elections/compulsory-voting-and-against
 
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