Facebook Instagram Twitter YouTube

It’s Time to Lower the Voting Age

U.S. democracy is hardly democratic. Young people are forced to sell their labor and take on massive student loans to survive, but they are unable to choose what kind of world they live in. Lowering the voting age to 16 would give a voice to millions of teenagers across the country who are recently politicized and deeply invested in issues like defunding the police and climate change. 

M.K. Kumar

October 31, 2020
Facebook Twitter Share
Photo: Lindsey Wasson

The United States is and always has been a bourgeois democracy that preserves and furthers the interests of the elite at the expense of the marginalized and the working class. One of the key ways that the capitalists and political elite maintain control is through a slew of voter suppression tactics. Gerrymandering; the disenfranchisement of the incarcerated, formerly incarcerated, and immigrants; and the existence of the Electoral College make voting burdensome — if not outright impossible — for the majority of Americans. The youth are among these disenfranchised sectors: they are able to work, but unable to vote in elections where their future is at stake. 

From the point of view of the establishment, the participation of more working class people and oppressed groups in elections would threaten the state’s authority. After all, the participation of the masses would show how truly undemocratic American “democracy” is and make it easier for leftward movements to find expression at the electoral level. The youth are especially seen as a threat to the bourgeois establishment because they are likely to be won over to leftist politics: an Axios survey revealed that 70% of millennials would vote for a socialist candidate. In 2017, Corbyn and the Labour Party tabled a motion to lower the voting age to 16 in the UK. Due to loud opposition from the conservative Tories and Theresa May, the motion never took off. In the US, Democrats and Republicans both are against the idea of lowering the voting age: a Massachusetts poll showed that registered Democrats opposed 16-year-old voting by a 48-41 percentage while Republicans were opposed 9-to-1. 

Climate activist — and daughter of Representative Ilhan Omar — Isra Hirsi, recently tweeted “hi I’m a communist.” She is representative of a shift within Gen Z , where the youth are loudly socialist and leftist, unwilling to subscribe to — or at the very least, resistant to — the dual-party capitalist system. This shift is a consequence of the material conditions that Gen Z and Millennials have grown up with: a precarious economy with two painful recessions, staggering amounts of student debt, brutal and racist police violence on the streets, decades of destructive U.S.-led imperialist wars, the burgeoning climate crisis, and ever growing income inequality. Capitalism is less enticing each and every day, even more so in the aftermath of a bungled Coronavirus response where thousands were infected and died, all to keep the economy humming along for a few corporations whose executives and board members continued to rake in millions of dollars in profits. Gen Z sees that socialism is the future, but without the vote, they have no real way to realize it. 

There is some change happening: this November, San Franciscans will have the opportunity to vote on a measure to lower the voting age to 16 for local elections; in nearby Berkeley, high school students have been allowed to vote in school board elections since 2016. Voter registration efforts in Oregon allow 16 and 17-year-olds to pre-register to vote once they turn 18. But these measures are merely cosmetic changes to what remains a deeply undemocratic political system. After all, 16-year olds still pay taxes on their income and work without limits on hours; if imprisoned, they are often tried as adults. The state controls teens’ reality and choices, but they have no platform by which to be critical or express anger and dissatisfaction toward the state. 

The voting age has been lowered before: the 26th Amendment was instituted because student activists protesting the Vietnam War organized to fight for the right to vote. 18 year olds had to pay taxes, could get married, and were drafted to fight in the Vietnam War — but they were unable to vote for their “representatives” in the highest offices of the U.S. government on decisions directly related to their lives. Activists adopted the slogan “Old Enough to Fight, Old Enough to Vote” to voice their demands, and a mass movement to lower the voting age grew across the country, eventually making it to Congress. After the states ratified the 26th Amendment and Nixon certified it in 1971, 11 million potential voters were added to the electorate, about half of whom exercised their right to vote in the 1972 election.

16-year olds need to be able to weigh in on local elections and state and federal ones too. As laid out in the Left Voice program, giving youth the right to vote is one of several reforms that need to take place for a leftward shift in consciousness at the electoral level. This fight would simultaneously reveal the extent to which democracy is curtailed and silenced by the bourgeois classes. Young people, as workers and future workers and those who face an uncertain future under capitalism, will be an important part of the formation of any truly independent workers party. By garnering the ability to vote, young people can begin to express their dissatisfaction with the current system and build consensus around the types of changes we want to see and work toward the ultimate goal: overthrowing the capitalist state and socialist revolution. 

Facebook Twitter Share

United States

NYC Mayor Eric Adams stands at a podium.

The Housing Crisis and Migrant Crisis Are Crises of Capitalism

As thousands of people come to the U.S. seeking shelter, politicians around the country are claiming that housing in the U.S. is already in crisis and that there is no room for them. Both the “migrant crisis” and “housing crisis” are crises created and exacerbated by capitalism.

Mike Pappas

September 20, 2023

To Win, the UAW Strike Must Be Organized from Below

The strike at the Big Three has put the working class at the center of national politics. The autoworkers’ demands are bold and touch on issues of growing exploitation across the country. To win big, the strike must be organized from below.

Tristan Taylor

September 18, 2023

The KOSA Bill Is Another Attack on LGBTQ+ People, People of Color, and Children’s Right To Learn

KOSA is ultimately a surveillance bill whose purpose is to limit the spread of progressive politics that pose a threat to the state.

Olivia Wood

September 14, 2023

Drop the Charges, Defend the Movement, #StopCopCity 

The Left must take up a mass campaign to defend activists facing state repression that threatens the democratic and civil rights of protesters everywhere.

Brian H. Silverstein

September 12, 2023

MOST RECENT

China’s Rise, ‘Diminished Dependency,’ and Imperialism in Times of World Disorder

In this broad-ranging interview, originally published in LINKS, Trotskyist Fraction member Esteban Mercatante discusses how recent global shifts in processes of capital accumulation have contributed to China’s rise, the new (and old) mechanisms big powers use to plunder the Global South, and its implications for anti-imperialist and working-class struggles today.

Esteban Mercatante

September 22, 2023
President Biden giving a speech on Friday, September 15, about the UAW strike. A UAW sign in the background.

Joe Biden Is Afraid of the UAW Strike. That’s a Good Thing.

A few days ago, Biden called on the bosses of the Big Three automakers to give concessions to the striking UAW workers. It’s because he’s scared of the UAW’s power.

Enid Brain

September 20, 2023
Migrants from Northern Africa sit in lines on the Italian island of Lampedusa.

Crisis in Lampedusa: Down with Fortress Europe, Open the Borders!

The way out of the immigration crisis is through the struggle against imperialism. This is a declaration from the European organizations of the Trotskyist Fraction - Fourth International.

Germany Is Threatening to Deport Palestinian Refugees for Their Activism

#StandWithZaid: Zaid Abdulnasser, the coordinator of the Palestine solidarity network Samidoun Germany, is a Palestinian refugee from Syria. The German are threatening to revoke his residence permit due to his political activism.

Tom Krüger

September 18, 2023