Is Voting a Right?
There are natural rights and then there are procedural rules designed to protect those rights. Voting is not a natural right.
If your natural rights are being protected/respected, then how is NOT being able to vote an infringement on one's freedoms?
In our country's founding, there were lots of restrictions on who could vote.
As a matter of fact, over two century's we have voted away most of the freedoms enumerated in the Constitution.
On a different front: Often I find myself reminding people who are younger than myself that many freedoms I have lost over my lifetime and the lifetime of my parents, are acutely felt because you had them and took them for granted or the opposite cherished them and they have been taken away. IF you are raised without them, you have no idea what has been lost.
If your natural rights are being protected/respected, then how is NOT being able to vote an infringement on one's freedoms?
In our country's founding, there were lots of restrictions on who could vote.
As a matter of fact, over two century's we have voted away most of the freedoms enumerated in the Constitution.
On a different front: Often I find myself reminding people who are younger than myself that many freedoms I have lost over my lifetime and the lifetime of my parents, are acutely felt because you had them and took them for granted or the opposite cherished them and they have been taken away. IF you are raised without them, you have no idea what has been lost.
Likewise, so long as we agree to our current form of government, then I have a duty to exercise my capacity to indicate my preference in representation. Not to do so should eliminate my ability to complain about the outcome, not that that is feasible.
There are many ways of advancing one's life without voting. To lose the right of complaint because you chose not to exercise a procedural right is wrong. There may be other important opportunities that supersede voting or there may not be a candidate you would choose to vote for. This should not invalidate one's right to complain.
du·ty
ˈd(y)o͞otē/Submit
noun
1.
a moral or legal obligation; a responsibility.
"it's my duty to uphold the law"
synonyms: responsibility, obligation, commitment; More
(of a visit or other undertaking) done from a sense of moral obligation rather than for pleasure.
modifier noun: duty
"a fifteen-minute duty visit"
2.
a task or action that someone is required to perform.
"the queen's official duties"
synonyms: job, task, assignment, mission, function, charge, place, role, responsibility, obligation...
Unfortunately, in today's world, if you are to protect your liberty it is an action you are required to perform. Loose interpretation...
However, I can hear the argument that the system is so flawed, the weapon is useless and therefor no honor in the act.
I will say, I felt the removal of voting for a period of time for the guests n this site acutely. It really bothered me.
A person may exercise freedom by not serving to defend the freedom that gives them choice. By doing so, they pass on certain perks awarded to those who do serve, earned by virtue of service. but both the person who serves and the person who does not serve enjoy freedom.
A soldier in a volunteer army does not serve as obligation or coercion, but because they have a sense of duty to defend the system that would give them the freedom to choose to serve or not. They choose to serve and are equal to those who do not serve, but by serving they acquire benefits awarded to those who do serve.
In this country we choose to not link voting privileges to service - only to citizenship.
My personal opinion is that voting should be linked to service. If your voting right is bot worth purchasing by service, you will not value it properly. IMHO
Robbie53024 wrote: "It would have to be limited to those that reach the age of majority and legal citizens, otherwise it would encourage lots of babies and illegals."
Moreover, shares (citizenship) could be bought and sold repeatedly. The price of a vote would rise close to elections and fall in the off season. People could change "citizenship" i.e., voting rights often, repeatedly, and for a profit (buy low, sell high). In point of fact voting for President of the USA is pointless but voting in the Mayoral Primary is highly important. So, the shrewd citizen should sell their vote before the one and buy it back before the other.
Robbie53024 wrote: "What would work might be to issue everyone one share and they could sell their share on the open market. Those that value their vote would only sell it for a lot, if at all. Those that didn't would get rid of it at a low price and quickly and live with the consequence."
But it would not be a PERMANENT consequence. Why is citizenship different from any other service or commodity?
I disagree with the statement that we've voted away most of the freedoms enumerated in the Constitution. Rather, we've failed to exercise our right to enforce the protection of our natural rights. We've been cowards and we've been lazy and we've been fools. Anyone that imagines that a vote means anything or serves to protect freedom is living in a fool's paradise. A vote is merely your acceptance of the slavery imposed on you by the power mongers, the manipulators, the user's, and the looters of our society.
The ONLY way you maintain the ability to exercise your rights is to exercise all of them, particularly that right to hold accountable anyone that acts in such a way as to diminish those rights. That accountability is not a simple vote to replace them in office. It must be proportional to the right they tried to diminish or take away as well as any personal or property gains they received or gained from those activities.
But until we learn and accept that our rights exist outside of and despite of governance and that whether or not we voted, we do not owe respect and fealty to any government or representative of such, we have no freedom. Respect is to be earned. Fealty is slavery. The power of your vote is illusion.
You are very correct that at the founding of the US there were many restrictions on voting. It was not covered in the Constitution as the Constitution laid that responsibility on the states. Some of those states allowed women to vote, some allowed free blacks to vote, some restricted voting to land-owners.
Are there any other requirements? This depends upon the laws of the various controlling authorities.
It seems to me that citizenship is the only requirement. Are you a citizen of the voting region you reside in? If yes you nmay vote. If not, you may not. there are conditions place upon this for criminals and others, but in general, If you live there you may vote if a citizen.
After property rights this is the most important right. (see Khalling follow-up post for more info on this aspect of rights).
I disagree it is a right.
What about the right to self defense? Free speech? association? contract? ......see where I'm going
That is one reason I object to the wording of the 14th amendment. It changes the rights of a citizen to privileges. As you know, Privileges age something given, not something you have.
You say “all the ability to vote gives you the "right" for others to turn you into a slave””. No one has the right to turn anyone into a slave. You may give permission to someone to make you a slave but they don’t have the right to do so. They may have sufficient force to capture you, bind you and make you work for them. Capability to do something does not equal the right to do something. Might does not equal right.
There is an underpinning that has not been mentioned and should be.
The right to vote entails having a governmental system that recognizes the basic rights of all people. The right to “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. If you live in a dictatorship or Monarchy or Oligarchy that does not recognize these right and actively suppressed them we have a different situation.
Without a government that recognizes the rights of individuals, you are correct, voting doesn’t matter at all. There you have the right to establish a government that does so recognize the rights of people to be free. We did it in `775 (the true start of the revolution) and codified it in 1`776, and finalized in in 1787.
You say “The right to vote is a procedural safeguard. If you have a right to vote, but not a right to your life, what good does that do you? You can't exercise the right to vote if you are not "alive"-except in Chicago. “
If you have allowed the government to deprive you of all freedom, then you have decayed to a state that is in need of recovery. If your vote is meaningless because the government has slowly (or quickly) taken you rights away, you must re-assert you rights and take back your freedoms. You no longer live in a Republic or a democracy. At best you live in an Oligarchy and at worst a true dictatorship. At this point you must reassert your rights.
Consider England at the time of the revolution. If you lived in England, you were represented in Parliament. If you lived in the colonies, you had no representation. You did not have a vote. Having no voice in the Parliament you (the colonists) were effectively slave of he King and Parliament. You had to comply with the laws or face involuntary servitude (prison). The colonies did what needed to be done. They became free.
(To figure this out, j_IR1776wg, start with the axiom that a right is something for which you do not need to ask permission.)
The simplest and earliest barrier was that in order to vote, you had to pay taxes, i.e, own property. One of the basic problems with that is that merchants typically do not own land, but rent their homes. Also, their inventories often are not their own property. Moreover, the essence of production is human intelligence and there is no way to measure that - or has not been. (Perhaps holding patents or copyrights could be recognized as evidence of production. After all no farmer ever had to prove that their acres were productive, only that they held them and paid taxes on them.)
In _The Secret of the League: the story of a social war_ by Ernest Bramah (1907) after the producers take back the country, they institute a voting mechanism like that of corporations: one share, one vote, with no limit.
make your point cg
Perhaps you need to look upon seeking elective office for the purpose originally intended, to protect the Constitution and the citizens that live in this nation under that protection.
I do agree that most elected politicians seem to think that passing laws limiting the lives of citizens should be their purpose. No one could be more wrong than those politicians.. Every law or rule needed was indeed covered by the founding fathers, that's why we used to think of them as being the brightest men that this nation ever produced.
Lets return to their principles and return this nation to its former glory and leadership in the world. I am an immigrant and have seen the changes brought on by these mice of politicians today, and these changes have not been for the better.
Fred Speckmann
commonsenseforamericans@yahoo.com
Congratulations on your efforts. Please keep in mind teh statement by that great philosopher Groucho Marx. "I will never join any organization that would have me as a member." Where are you running for office?
Fred
For me, it is a sacrifice. Since I have to travel (mostly) for work, telling my boss that I will need to be home one week a month should I win, is going to be a challenge. He's a pretty good sort, and I'm sure won't have a problem, but it will mean that instead of my willingness to travel at the drop of a hat, I will need to have some times blocked out.
Besides just ensuring that county government doesn't veer out of control, I'm also enraged that we own an elder care facility and 2 golf courses. Yes, the county government is in direct competition with private industry. That's not government's role and I want to move to get rid of them.
A recent post here showing the low information voters is a prime example that not everyone should be voting at the government level by their choice of not being informed on the issues, people running for the office.
As far as organizations, associations, privately run web sites, there can and should be a pay to play factor and that is determined by the board of the organization or owner etc.
The biggest advantage that leviathan has is the short memory (and lifespan) of the people. The government has learned they must slowly raise the temperature to boil the live frogs.
I tell my children of a time in my life when you had to actually look for government rather than having it imposed in your face every day from every front. A time when people actually solved their own problems and directed their own lives.