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Should Compulsory Voting Be Mandatory Voting?

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The idea of compulsory voting has been discussed for almost every democratic nation in the world. It has been shown to work for some nations but, would compulsory voting benefit the United States? Many have posited that if all were forced to vote, many would vote at random or on a whim, randomizing our democratic process. This would undermine our political system and put into office whoever happens to be randomly selected. Many who push for compulsory voting say that it will even the playing field, forcing those underprivileged parties that did not vote before to vote. I see this as a movement in the wrong direction. The people that should be voting are those who have an opinion on the election, or want one of the candidates over the others, but that is not always who is voting. Many either can not because it is too hard, or do not because they believe it is too hard. The effort should be spent on making voting accessible to every American citizen. In the end compulsory voting is not the solution to the problem of low voter turnout, as it raises many more problems in itself. For many countries mandatory voting has worked well but that alone does not mean that it will work well for the United States. There are many factors that have to be considered first. All countries that have implemented compulsory voting are smaller than the United States and do not share all of our culture and values. Many Americans prize their sense of freedom and place it above all else. Mandatory

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