Should The US Have Mandatory Voting? [View all]

[Prophet 451]

So, here's the idea. The turnout for the midterms was shit. The turnout for midterms is always shit. It is a civic good for more people to vote as this (in theory) makes government more representative. Coincidentally, low turnout favors (generally) Republicans and high turnout (generally) favors Democrats. Australia (IIRC) has compulsory voting. If you don't vote, you have to either justify it to a judge or get fined a small amount (like, $20).

So I came up with a few options but all of them require an automatic voter registration. That shouldn't be too hard to do. AFAIK, the US is the only democratic country where you have to actually register to vote. Every other country I know of, you're automatically registered by virtue of being a living citizen. So I'm proposing that, firstly, the US just start automatically registering everyone to vote, the Social Security register has everyone's name and address anyway, it wouldn't be too difficult to register everyone off that. Then, one of these options.

Option A: The US gets compulsory voting. You have to turn up at a polling place, mark or mail in a ballot or you get fined a small amount unless you can justify it to a judge (all proceeds go to funding future elections).

Option B: The US switches to entirely postal voting. In the weeks running up to an election, every eligible citizen gets mailed a polling card. They mark their choice, sign it and mail it back, just like with overseas military votes. Free of postal costs, obviously.

Option C: The US switches to fully online voting. The idea here is that there's a database in every state with everyone's name and SS number. You go to a website, input your SS number. The system checks against the database that you are eligible and haven't already voted. If you clear both of those, you get to pick your choice. Now, the drawback with this one is that, if it's online, it is potentially hackable. However, cyber-security is now at such a level that, given enough funding and expertise, you could make the threat of a hack virtually impossible.

Option D: Things carry on as they are, with barely anyone turning out for midterms.

32 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Yes
	10 (31%)
	No
	18 (56%)
	Yes but totally postal votes
	2 (6%)
	Online voting
	0 (0%)
	I like chocolate-mint ice cream
	0 (0%)
	Am I hungry? Who's hungry?
	2 (6%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
Show usernames Disclaimer: This is an Internet poll