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057150This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-NC-NDThis Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-NC-NDDid You Know?After every American election, politicians, journalists, and activists bemoan the same thing: low voter turnout. But in some countries, turnout isn't even a question! In Australia, Brazil, Greece, Singapore, Argentina, Austria, among others, voting isn't just a right—it’s a pulsory voting?means that all eligible citizens must vote. If you don't, you could be subject to a fine, or even imprisonment!Why mandatory voting? By requiring citizens to vote, countries can make sure that the government is representing the will of the whole population. In the United States, for instance, barely half of all eligible citizens vote in presidential elections. And only about a third of them vote in the midterms! So, a minority of potential voters are making decisions for all of us.People who favor compulsory voting also point out that voting is a civic duty, like paying taxes or sitting on juries, both of which are requirements for citizens of the United States. If democracy is about the will of the people, then the will of the people must be expressed!So, why haven't we tried it in the U.S.? Well, democracy isn't the only sacred principle in the United States. Individual liberties are also protected. Preserving Americans' freedom of choice includes the choice?not?to vote. Plus, for some people, it's not really a choice! Election Day falls on a Tuesday, and not everyone can get time off of work to vote or make the trip to the polls. It's not fair to penalize people who can't vote even if they want to.What do you think? What's more important: individual liberty or representative democracy? Is it really a democracy if only a small percentage of people vote?Answer questions 1 – 6 on Worksheet.Read number 7 on worksheet before you continue reading.018859500Way Back WhenThese days, presidential elections are?extremely?competitive. Campaigns kick off months—or even years—before Election Day. Candidates participate in multiple debates and spend millions of dollars on advertising. Plus, they have to fundraise non-stop to pay for staffers, cross-country trips, and near constant self-promotion.Things were a little different back in 1789, when?George Washington?was elected President of the newly established United States. In fact, Washington didn’t even have an opponent! The framers of the Constitution simply assumed the beloved war hero would take over as the nation’s chief executive. Though 11 others received votes, no one formally ran against Washington.In those days, each member of the Electoral College would cast two votes. Whoever received the most votes became President. The runner-up was elected Vice President.The final tally in 1789? All 69 electors voted for Washington. The only one whose vote tally even came close was John Adams, with 34 electoral votes. Talk about a landslide!Washington was easily elected to a second term but declined to run for a third. That's when America held its first competitive presidential election. In 1796, John Adams, of the Federalist Party, squared off against Thomas Jefferson, a Democratic-Republican. After a bitterly contested race, Adams squeaked out a win with 71 votes to Jefferson's 68. The political adversaries were forced to serve alongside each other in the same administration!In 1804, the?12th Amendment?put an end to this method of selecting Vice Presidents. Electors now vote separately for President and Vice President. Parties keep things simple by running President-Vice President tickets, with one person running specifically for each office. However, the spirited opposition between rival parties that took root in the post-Washington era has continued. Some would even say this bitter party antagonism has become the defining element of the American political system.ANSWER QUESTION 8 ON WORKSHEET385762515748000Real LifeAmerican women received the constitutional right to vote in 1920, with the passage of the?19th Amendment. But that wasn't the first year they went to the polls. The women of the Wild West had been making their voices heard at the ballot box for 50 years!In 1869, Wyoming was still a U.S. territory—and one with a pretty progressive stance on women's rights. It took up a bill proposing "that every woman of the age of twenty-one years, residing in this Territory, may at every election to be holden under the law thereof, cast her vote." Among other things, the legislature was hoping that granting women the right to vote would encourage women to move to Wyoming. At the time, the male-female ratio in the territory was six to one!Wyoming wasn't the first territory to consider such a bill. The Washington, Nebraska, and Dakota territories had all voted on women's suffrage—but none of the laws had passed. The federal government had also considered the issue. When the right to vote was extended to African-American men after the Civil War, many people argued that it should be extended to women as well. Both a bill and a constitutional amendment were introduced to do just that—but they both failed.In Wyoming, however, the all-male legislature voted to pass the bill. As the governor considered whether to sign it into law, the women of the territory kept a constant vigil outside his office. And sign it he did, making Wyoming the first U.S. territory with women’s suffrage. The following year, Louisa Ann Swain became the first woman to cast a ballot in the territory. And Esther Morris was appointed justice of the peace, becoming first American woman to hold public office.News of the victory traveled quickly to the east coast, where women such as Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton were working to secure the vote for?all?American women. Stanton and Anthony were thrilled. They visited Wyoming on the new transcontinental railroad and Anthony even called for eastern suffragists to move to Wyoming.Not everyone greeted the news so enthusiastically. Some members of Congress threatened to withhold statehood if Wyoming didn’t repeal its equal voting laws. Officials back in Cheyenne, the territory's capital, retorted that they would rather stay out of the Union for 100 years than repeal the right for women to vote!Wyoming became a state in 1890—and the first one to allow women to vote. This earned it the nickname, “Equality State.” And the American West—the new America—continued to lead the way on women's suffrage. By the time the 19th Amendment passed, 19 states and territories had already granted women at least partial voting rights. The vast majority of these were frontier states, which had been in the Union for fewer than 100 years.ANSWER NUMBER 9 ON WORKSHEET ................
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