College Students Should Vote Speech

Since 1972, youth voter turnout has been on the decline. According to the Child Trends Databank, 50 percent of Americans aged 18 to 24 participated in the 1972 presidential election (2015). Nearly three decades later, the percentage of young adults aged 18 to 24 who voted in the 2000 presidential election had dropped eighteen

Being able to cast my first vote in the 21st century is a privilege. My generation needs to accept their patriotic responsibility and vote because many reforms are needed in order to carry us into the new millennium. Voting reforms are necessary to inspire political participation for other modifications and adjustments needed in areas such as health care, education, and Social Security, all which we as young people will face in the future. Participation in elections is necessary to facilitate and enable progress, but our present day system of voting is expiring by frustrated Americans.

Voting has not always been as easy as it is today. It is interesting to examine how far America has progressed in its process of allowing different types of people to be able to vote. Voting was once aimed at a particular group of people, which were white males that owned their own property. Today, most people over the age of eighteen can vote, except for the mentally incompetent or people who have been convicted of major felonies in some states. The decline of voter participation has always been a debate in the public arena. According to McDonald and Popkin, it is “the most important, most familiar, most analyzed, and most conjectured trend in recent American political history (2001, 963)” The question is, how important is voter

Political inactivity on the part of young Americans stems from one fundamental source -- a general cynicism of the American political process. This disdain for politics is further perpetuated by a lack of voter education and a needlessly archaic voting procedure that creates barriers to voting where they need not exist. While many of these existing problems can be rectified with relative ease through the implementation of programs such as Internet voting and better voter education, such programs create only a partial solution.

Rhetorical Analysis: The primary audience for this paper includes every citizen aged eighteen and above eligible to vote in the United States. The proposed topic mostly concerns these individuals due to the fact, they are affected by presidential voting institutions. Throughout this paper, I will be arguing in favor of the Electoral College, with an end goal of persuading my audience of the benefits of the system.

In conclusion, young voters need to take an active role in government in order to continue one of the founding principles of our country which is that we are an democratically elected republic who is looking out for the interest of all of its people. The problem lies not within the older generation who have high turnout rates and are concerned with supporting issues relative to their stage in life. Instead, the burden lies upon the apathetic younger generation whose unique ideals, viewpoints, and experiences are being squandered because we are not voting. It is time for young Americans to step up to the plate.

The main point according Martin P. Wattenberg in Is Voting For Young People is that young people today do not vote during elections as much compared to other voting groups. Young people today are politically unengaged. “These state patterns of voting participation can be confirmed on the national level by the Census Bureau’s 2010 survey data. Among U.S. citizens under the age of 30 in 2010, only 24 percent reported that they voted.” (Page-188, IVYP) The low attendance of young people voting in Presidential elections indicates that young people do not care enough about politics to participate.

This chapter reviews the much-discussed low voter turnout and the poor percentage of other forms of political participation in the United States. After reading and reviewing the material in this chapter, the student should be able to do each of the following:

It seems as though the younger population of voters have all grown up in a world where they have been influenced to believe that their one vote will not make a difference, and therefore they do not bother to take the time out of their busy schedules to cast their meaningless vote. In the last presidential election, only one out of four citizens between the ages of eighteen and twenty-four casted their vote (“Is the System broken?”). The opinion that one vote will not make a difference appears to be directly respondent to the younger generation of voters. This generation needs to be educated on the difference that one vote can make.

In our world, there are many social issues to discuss about that affect the way we live our lives. One particular issue that’s significant is the voter turnout of young people during the 2014 mid-term election. So my question is why do young people not vote as much as the old? Well I checked my sources and I discovered some intriguing facts. During the mid-term election, voter turnout was the worst ever since World War 2. It was rather disappointing and pathetic for the youth of America. People between the ages of 18-29 represented only 13 percent of the votes. On the other hand, the old were much better as people between 45-64 represented about 43 percent. Another interesting statistic is that

Two demographic characteristics associated with voting are age and level of education. Statistics show that the older one is, the more likely they are to participate in voting and other government-related processes. However, in the hustle and bustle of young life, many young people do not vote. Now, with there being more young people than elders, this often relates to low voter turnout. Similarly, those with higher levels of education are more likely to vote than the under-educated. Now, think of this: America is filled with impoverished people that do not have high levels of education. In addition, the US has college as a necessity priced as a luxury; many people simply cannot afford this higher education and (like my friend Ryan) think "I won't vote because I don't know enough to do it."

Age of the voter is a factor that can affect how they vote or who they decide to vote for. There is a common belief that younger people tend to vote more democratic but studies show that this is not always what has happened in previous elections (Fisher, 2008). For example, Fisher explains how in the elections from 1960 through 1976 younger people were the most democratic but in elections from 1980 through 1992 younger people were the most republican voters (Fisher,

B. What other conditions contribute to low voter turnout? Also look at “America in Perspective” to answer this question. –the requirement of voter registration

Presidential candidates are picked by an electoral college which is represented by the popular vote in that state. Many times candidates might have a popular vote, but lack the electoral college needed to win an election. Within in the past few years voting turn out has been horrible. Many times in reports and studies, it shows that the younger generation and minorities do not have high turn outs for voter participation. In this article, “If Anyone Ever Tells You Your Vote Doesn't Matter, Show Them This” by Sean McElwee points out that this information in fact is true. Younger people do not participate in voting because they believe that their vote has no effect in presidential elections. The thing that stood out the most was how young people

College graduates make more money, on average. They are more likely to look for information about politics, and they are more likely to have friends who vote (Bethany Brookeshire). Some millennials use the excuse that they will be "out of town" on election day but, they can also cast their vote via absentee ballot, which is a vote cast by someone who is unable or unwilling to attend the official polling station to which the vote is normally allocated.