Friday, February 8, 2008

Voting @ 16

A new York Times Op-Ed piece reasons we should reconsider many of our age-related privileges...like voting; arguing that:
Legal age requirements should never stand alone. They should be flexible and pragmatic and paired with educational and cognitive requirements for the exercise of legal maturity.

and
...16-year-olds who want to start voting should be able to obtain an “early voting permit” from their high schools upon passing a simple civics course similar to the citizenship test. Besides increasing voter registration, this system would reinforce the notion of voting as a privilege and duty as well as a right — without imposing any across-the-board literacy tests for those over 18.

That last bit of thinking sounds sound to me.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I guess if one can get a permit to drive, one can also obtain a voting permit- perhaps even at the same time.