Chapter 6: Voting Behavior

  1. Nonvoting
  2. Low voter turnout compared with Europeans (U.S. 50%, Europe 70%), but this compares registered voters with the eligible adult population
  3. Commonly explained by voter apathy on election day, but the real problem is low registration rates
  4. Proposed solution: get-out-the-vote drives, but this will not help those who are not registered
  5. Apathy not the only cause of nonvoting
  6. Voting is not the only way of participating
  7. Writing government officials
  8. Volunteering for campaign
  9. Speak before local board or city council
  10. Voting turnout
  11. Two methods of measurement
  12. Showing proportion of registered voters that actually vote
  13. Showing proportion of eligible voters that actually vote
  14. 75-80% of registered voters voted in recent presidential elections but only 50% of eligible voters voted in recent presidential elections
  15. Reasons for decline
  16. Process of voter registration

a)Required by all states except North Dakota

b)No more than 30 day waiting period allowed (reside in state for “x” amount of time before being allowed to register)

c)National Voter Registration Act (Motor Voter law) allows people to register at DMV and other local government offices

(1)Increased the number of independent registrants

(2)Increased registration among eligible voters

(3)Did not create a general boom in voter turnout

(4)Did not change the two party balance of registrants

(5) May actually add registrants who are less likely to vote

  1. Difficulty of absentee voting
  2. Too many officials to elect – Vote for more public officials and hold more elections than other democracies
  3. Weekday, non-holiday voting

a)1st Tuesday, after the 1st Monday in November in even-numbered years

b)Other countries vote on the weekend or it’s a national holiday

  1. Weak political parties
  1. Universal turnout probably would not alter election outcomes

  1. Extension of voting rights
  2. From state to federal control
  3. Initially, states decided nearly everything
  4. This led to wide variation in federal elections
  5. Today Congress has since reduced state prerogatives
  6. In the beginning had to be white, male property owner
  7. Universal (white) manhood suffrage by end of Andrew Jackson’s presidency
  8. Black voting rights
  9. Fifteenth Amendment -- voting cannot be denied because of race, color or previous servitude
  10. Southern states then used evasive strategies to keep blacks from voting – called Jim Crow laws

a)Literacy test – had to prove could read & write at certain level

b)Poll tax – had to pay money to vote (outlawed by 24th amendment)

c)White primaries

d)Grandfather clauses – you could vote if your grandfather was allowed to vote previous to 1870

e)Intimidation and violence

  1. Most of these strategies ruled out by Supreme Court
  2. Major change with 1965 Voting Rights Act which prohibited discriminatory practices like literacy tests and set up process for poll watching; black vote increases
  1. Women's voting rights
  2. Western states permitted women to vote
  3. Nineteenth Amendment ratified 1920 – voting cannot be denied because of sex
  4. No dramatic changes in outcomes but number of eligible voters doubled
  5. Youth vote
  6. Twenty-sixth Amendment ratified 1971 allows 18, 19 and 20 year-olds to vote
  7. Lower turnout; no particular party

  1. Who participates in politics?
  2. Forms of participation
  3. Voting the most common, but 8 to 10 percent misreport it
  4. Verba and Nie's six types of participants

a)Inactives (22% of population)

(1)Rarely vote, don’t get involved in organizations & don’t talk about politics

(2)Little education, low income & young

b)Voting specialists vote but do little else; not much education or income, substantially older

c)Campaigners vote & get involved in campaign activities; better educated than average voter; interested in politics; identify with a political party

d)Communalists more involved locally

e)Parochial participants do not vote & stay out of campaigns but contact local officials

f)Complete activists (11 % of population)

(1)Participate in all forms of politics

(2)Highly educated, high incomes, middle-aged

  1. Voting behavior
  2. Party identification
  3. Issues
  4. Candidate’s record and image
  5. Voter’s background

a)Education more education = more likely to vote

b)Religious involvement -- church-goers vote more

c)Race & ethnicity

(1)Whites have high voting rate than blacks & Latinos

(2)But if control for education & income, they have same rate

(3)But controlling for SES, blacks higher than whites

d)Age

(1)Voting levels for 18-24 year olds are the lowest

(2)Older people more likely to voter than younger people

(3)45 & above vote the most

e)Gender -- men and women vote same rate

f)Occupation

  1. Individuals are influenced by many factors and they form cross-cutting cleavages – so must control for differences when comparing voting rates
  2. Level of trust in government has no impact on voting rates
  1. The meaning of participation rates
  2. Americans vote less but participate more
  3. Other forms of activity becoming more common
  4. Some forms more common here than in other countries