I was reading SB 5621 last night (yes, that’s what I do to unwind at night, read proposed legislation; it helps me fall asleep), a bill that would lower the voting age in local school board elections to 14, and while I don’t particularly remember 14-year-olds doing all that well electing student council representatives when I was that age, if you’ve ever sat through a Seattle School Board meeting or three, you gotta wonder if, compared to their elders, could the kids do worse?

But putting aside concerns over any impact this bill might have on the quality of the elected officials, what has me leaning in favor of expanding the school board franchise to high schoolers, is the potential impact this might have on the quality of the electors. Get kids voting early, and in races that clearly demonstrate the influence elections have over their day to day lives, and you just might get an uptick in participation in the broader electoral process once they hit 18.

And any uptick in the youth vote couldn’t be bad for America, because… well… they couldn’t do worse.

10 replies on “They Couldn’t Do Worse”

  1. Sorry, but this sounds like a wingnut plan.

    Gather all the teenage cult victims to vote for whichever holy roller their parents insist on.

  2. Sure! And who is going to get the most kids to vote?

    Church! Get those youth group kids out there recruiting votes for insane people who believe that a monster up in the sky hates it when we have sex!

  5. so a 14 year old is considered mature enough to vote, but not have sex, buy a lotto ticket or drink? I call bullshit on this unless we lower the age of adulthood to 14

  6. I’d support this IF the 14-year-olds had already passed a civics test more or less equivalent to the citizenship test a prospective citizen has to take. Then again, I think *everyone* should have to pass that test before they can vote.

  8. Great plot for a movie…oh, wait, already done:

    Wild In The Streets (1968)
    http://www.stomptokyo.com/badmoviereport…

    Besides being convinced that they’re not going to live past 30, Max and his droogs…. sorry, his friends… hold certain feelings dear, like “Thirty’s death, man….when you’re thirty, the only thing that gets you high is sending guys to kill other guys.” Senate wannabe Jerry Fergus (Hal Holbrook) asks Max to sing at a rally, as Fergus is running on an “18 year-olds get the vote” platform (Younger readers may need to be reminded that at the time, the legal voting age was 21). Max uses this bully pulpit to demand that the voting age be lowered to 14, sings a song called “14 or Fight”, and calls for a demonstration on Sunset Strip.

    Max Frost for President!Thousands show on the Strip, and Max forges an alliance with Fergus. In the spirit of political compromise, the California legislature lowers the voting age to 15, and Max asks the gathered teens to peacefully go home. Fergus wins in a landslide, but his eldest son defects to Max’s camp with the news that an emergency election must be held to replace a dead 84 year-old senator. Senators must be at least 25 years old – Sally LeRoy turns 25 the day before the election. Max shifts into overdrive, with a song containing the immortal chorus, “Sally LeRoy/ She’s old enough for congress, boy”.

Comments are closed.