Why Do African Americans Participate In Elections?

The debate over compulsory vs. non-compulsory voting is a complex subject matter to say the least, that has sparked much controversy in recent times with almost all strongly in favor of one side of the argument and or the other. This highly polarized debate has sparked in popularity in recent times because of a quote by former president Barak Obama in which he said that “It would be transformative if everybody voted”. It is believed that if everyone voted that could and was eligible then the domination of hard core partisans within the political system would be in part quelled as the candidates went where the votes are, which would be away from the extremes. Moreover some studies show that mandatory voting decreases the rates of uninformed voters within an area as voting becomes more of a civic duty than right. While the institution of compulsory voting would have a short term effect of increasing the rate of uninformed voters,

1 Text to Text: 2 In the text "The most dangerous game" you are left with many moral dilemmas, wondering what is right and what will happen next. The main characters are Rains ford and General Zaroff, Rains ford is a wealthy author who has a passion for hunting. While General Zaroff also shares the same passion for hunting however to new extents .When Rainsford is left on a deserted island he and Zaroff meet ,Zaroff tells him about his new form of hunting ,because recognizes Rainford form his novels on hunting ,and gives a proposal to his new kind of hunting. Zaroff forces Rainford to scavenge in the jungle, escaping Zaroff and his hounds and servant for three days.

Robert Smalls preludes his essay Election Methods in the South by stating how important the right to vote is and how it is our given right by the Constitution to be able to vote no matter perceived differences. Smalls goes into detail how the government in South Carolina is corrupt in counting the ballot and in how there is no “free ballot.” “Elections since then have been carried by perjury and fraud – two things worshipped and adored by the South Carolina Democracy.” Smalls shows us two extremes polls not being open or being open but corrupt in counting for Republicans. He shows us how much the African American people and their votes are needed to make our government stronger as a whole.

Yeah, I know it’s been awhile, huh? I definitely miss you too. I hope your health is getting better. I can’t wait to see you and the family again. How are you and your family doing?

Dating back many decades, it appears that lobbying and politics have always gone hand and hand on any political stage. Lobbying has always had a strong presence in the legislation system. Lobbying is the process of offering campaign contributions, bribes, or information to policymakers for the purpose of achieving favorable policy outcomes. Conventional wisdom suggests that lobbying is the preferred mean for exerting political influence in rich countries and corruption in poor countries. The legislation is meant to benefit society and ensure that citizens are having their voices heard, instead of hindering them in favour of the multi-national corporations. Lobbying has a negative influence on legislations in both developed and developing

Voting is political power and restrictions diluted as well as denied any significant to the Negro right to vote. What good is a vote if the vote is not counted in the race.

Even after the passing of the Fifteenth Amendment, African Americans were “disenfranchised in the South by intimidation and electoral trickery, including whites-only primaries, rigged literacy tests, and poll taxes” (Patterson 2011, p. 180). The Freedom Riders rode through the South, enduring harassment and imprisonment to encourage other African Americans to vote. Voter turnout in African American communities is greatly encouraged. Personally, coming from an African American family, I was strongly encouraged by my parents and grandparents to vote when I was of legal age. My family instilled the importance of voting in me at a very young age. Although voter turnout among African Americans is still fairly low, in the 2008 presidential election African Americans had the second highest voter turnout, behind non-Hispanic Caucasians (African Americans, n.d.). Race can influence voter turnout because with African Americans specifically, although rates are getting better, they are still not high.

The year 1964 marked the official beginning of the realignment of the black population. The Republican party previous to this year never officially made a stance on race, so it was never considered a partisanship issue, until now. The political decisions of Goldwater, Nixon, and Reagan solidified the black democratic partisanship, as well as the Southern white republican partisanship. As the years have past the black democratic partisanship has become a racially polarized and the republicans have given up on achieving a higher black vote in elections. But maybe they should reconsider giving up and try a different approach that lets them keep their southern white vote and expand on the black vote that they are getting.

The Ku Klux Klan or KKK tried to stop Africans from voting (quickly ended with the passing of some acts). To prevent Africans from voting the KKK burned houses, burning schools, intimidating voters, and lynching. Later on, southerners used literacy tests and poll taxes to limit African voting. Easy literacy tests were given to white, while very hard literacy tests were given Africans, and it was ultimately decided by a person there (literacy test giver) whether the applier was applicable for voting or not. This limited many African Americans from voting. Poll taxes are a tax you have to pay to vote, so this also prevented many African Americans from voting. Finally the Grandfather Clause was passed which said that if you had a grandfather that was eligible to vote before a certain date, you could vote. This allowed many poor whites to vote, but also prevented many African Americans from

In order to prevent African Americans from voting, white’s enacted a variety of different measures used for preventing black voting. Of these measures three big ones were the use of violence, all white-primary elections, and the grandfather clause. For whites violence was a means in which they could forcibly prevent African Americans from voting in town elections. Many times blacks that tried to vote, received some kind of violent backlash, whether it was getting beat or losing their jobs. In 1898, Democrats from Grimes County, following their loss organized a secret brotherhood, in which they eventually in cold blood shot two black leaders (Henretta, pg. 609).

Voting is the foremost way to exhibit good citizenship and civil responsibility. People should get involved in elections and educated in all political measures. By this they become good and responsible participatory citizens. It should always be remembered that some people sacrifice their lives to preserve the freedom and voting opportunity as a sacred right. True democracy demands the involvement of the people otherwise in absence of that there is no democracy(Akande, 2011).

For generations, African Americans have been denied the right to be considered citizens, and even after they were granted the full protection of the law as citizens, they lacked descriptive representation in the government. According to several studies, while Democrats typically represent a majority of African

A large gender gap exists in the sub-Saharan Africa region when it comes to voting, there is a statistically seven-point gap that exists between men and women. In East Asian and Latin American nations, the gender gap is less than a percentage point, it is not as statistically significant as the sub-Saharan region. Results indicate that age seems to have a greater impact on voting participation than any other variable, the effect of age on voter turnout is consistent across all world regions. Turnout is lowest among young people and it rises as one grows older. Just 59% of young adults vote in East Asia vote, 63% of young adults vote in Latin America and 58% of young adults vote in Sub-Saharan African nations. Whereas, 89% of the older population in sub-Saharan Africa vote and 88% of the older population in Latin America vote. In short young people tend to shy away from voting. Bratton, Chu and Largos point to voting registration policies as the reason behind this age

1 out of every 13 African Americans of voting age is disenfranchised, a rate more than four times greater than non-African

Although African women continue to make solid progress in becoming part of the political scene, there are limitations associated with this progress. More African women are beginning to enter the political landscape and are making great strides in influencing policies that favors the advancement of women.