The
Leon Jaworski
public programs
The
When Does Suffrage
Become Universal?
May 1, 2014 | 5:00 P.m. to 7:00 P.m.
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
Washington, D.C.
The
Leon Jaworski
public programs
Since 2001, the American Bar Association Division for Public Education
has conducted the Leon Jaworski public program series to commemorate
Law Day. The Jaworski public programs have examined themes of law,
politics, and culture and have operated on the premise that exploring fundamental legal identities and attributes help us better understand who we
are as Americans and as global citizens.
The Vote:
When Does Suffrage Become Universal?
Framing Questions
1.What is universal suffrage? What makes suffrage universal?
2.What is the history of universal suffrage? To what extent has it been
achieved? How was this accomplished—historically, politically, legally?
3.How does citizenship, as a value and as a status, shape our understanding of universal suffrage?
4.What is the relationship between universal suffrage and democracy? Is
it possible to have one without the other?
5.On what basis should the electorate be restricted or otherwise defined?
Citizenship? Residency? Age? Felony convictions? Mental incompetence? Who does universal suffrage include? Exclude? Why?
6.Is universal suffrage an essential legal-political value or norm? Is it truly
achievable? An aspirational ideal?
PROGRAM
Presiding
James R. Silkenat
President, American Bar Association
Welcomes
Pauline Weaver
National Law Day Chair
Jane Harman
Director, President and CEO
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
Moderator
John Milewski
Director of Digital Programming
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
Panelists
Roger Clegg
President and General Counsel
Center for Equal Opportunity
Aurelian Craiutu
Professor of Political Science and
Director, Tocqueville Program
Indiana University, Bloomington
Hendrik Hertzberg
Staff Writer, The New Yorker and
Board Member, FairVote
Claudio López-Guerra
Research Professor
Center for Research and Teaching in Economics (CIDE)
Department of Political Studies
Janai S. Nelson
Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Faculty Scholarship
St. John’s University School of Law
The
Leon Jaworski
public programs
The Vote:
When Does Suffrage Become Universal?
MODERATOR
John Milewski is director of digital programming
for the Woodrow Wilson International Center for
Scholars. He serves as executive producer, host, and
managing editor for a number of programs, including
CONTEXT and Wilson Center NOW. Mr. Milewski
is a veteran broadcast journalist and communications
professional with extensive experience as a moderator,
interviewer, anchor, reporter, and producer. He was part of the team that
opened the Newseum in 2008. As special programs manager and one of
the hosts of the interview program Inside Media, Mr. Milewski was a key
contributor to the early programming success of the critically acclaimed
museum. For 20 years, he served as executive producer, moderator, and
managing editor of Close Up on C-SPAN, one of the longest running news
and public affairs discussion programs in cable television history, while
also serving as vice president for outreach and communications for the
Close Up Foundation. Mr. Milewski is an instructor for The Pennsylvania State University, where he teaches a course on politics and media. In
addition, he is a regularly featured blogger for the Huffington Post. Mr.
Milewski is a frequent moderator for the Leon Jaworski and other public
programs and panel discussions conducted by the American Bar Association Division for Public Education.
d
4 | Leon Jaworski Public Programs
PANELISTS
Roger Clegg is President and General Counsel of the
Center for Equal Opportunity, a conservative research
and educational organization based in Falls Church,
Virginia. The Center specializes in civil rights, immigration, and bilingual education issues. Mr. Clegg
writes, speaks, and conducts research on legal issues
raised by civil rights laws. He also is a contributing editor at National
Review Online and writes frequently for it and USA Today, The Wall Street
Journal, The Washington Times, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and other
popular periodicals and law journals. From 1993 to 1997, Mr. Clegg was
vice president and general counsel of the National Legal Center for the
Public Interest, where he wrote and edited a variety of publications on
legal issues of interest to business. From 1982 to 1993, he held a number of
positions at the U.S. Department of Justice, including serving as Assistant
to the Solicitor General, where he argued three cases before the United
States Supreme Court, and as the number-two official in both the Civil
Rights and Environment and Natural Resources Divisions. Mr. Clegg is
a graduate of Rice University and received a JD from Yale Law School.
Aurelian Craiutu is Professor of Political Science
(Theory) at Indiana University, Bloomington, where he
also directs the Tocqueville Program associated with
the Elinor and Vincent Ostrom Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis. Professor Craiutu’s
research interests include French political and social
thought, political ideologies, and theories of transition to democracy and
democratic consolidation. He has taught courses on such topics as ­modern
revolutions, the nature of political philosophy, and theories of political
moderation. Professor Craiutu is the author of Liberalism under Siege:
The Political Thought of the French Doctrinaires, Tocqueville on America after
1840 (with Jeremy Jennings), America through European Eyes (with Jeffrey
C. Isaac), and Conversations with Tocqueville (with Sheldon Gellar), and,
most recently, A Virtue for Courageous Minds: Moderation in French Political Thought, 1748-1830, published by Princeton University Press in 2012.
Professor Craiutu has received awards and grants from several institutions,
The Vote: When Does Suffrage Become Universal? | 5
including the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and the American Council of Learned Societies. A native of Romania, he received a
BA in Economics from the Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest,
studied at the University of Rennes in France, and earned his PhD in
Politics from Princeton University in 1999.
Hendrik Hertzberg has been a speechwriter for President Jimmy Carter, editor of The New Republic, and
an editor and writer at The New Yorker. Mr. Hertzberg broke into journalism in 1966 as a cub reporter
for Newsweek in San Francisco, where he covered the
Beatles’ last concert, Ronald Reagan’s first campaign
for Governor, and the birth of hippiedom. In 1969, after three years’ active
duty in the U.S. Navy, he joined The New Yorker as a reporter for “The Talk
of the Town.” In 1976, Mr. Hertzberg decamped for the White House,
where he worked on all of President Carter’s major speeches—up to and
including the Farewell Address. For twelve years beginning in 1981, he was
associated with The New Republic, alternating with Michael Kinsley as the
magazine’s editor. Mr. Hertzberg covered the 1988 presidential campaign at
Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, where he was a fellow
at the Institute of Politics and then at the Shorenstein Center on the Press
and Public Policy. In 1992, Mr. Hertzberg rejoined The New Yorker, initially
as executive editor, and has been there ever since, currently as a staff writer.
A four-time winner of the National Magazine Award, Mr. Hertzberg is the
author of Politics: Observations & Arguments and ¡Obámanos!: The Birth
of a New Political Era, both published by Penguin. Since 1995 he has been
on the board of directors of FairVote, a research and advocacy organization
that promotes electoral reforms. Mr. Hertzberg is a graduate of Harvard
College.
Claudio López-Guerra is Research Professor in
the Department of Political Studies at the Center for
Research and Teaching in Economics (CIDE) in Mexico City. His area of study is political philosophy, in
particular the theory of democracy and the evaluation
of political institutions. Professor López-Guerra’s work has appeared in The
Journal of Political Philosophy; Politics, Philosophy, and Economics; and Social
6 | Leon Jaworski Public Programs
Theory and Practice. He has written extensively on the ethical foundations of
the right to vote. His book Democracy and Disenfranchisement: The Morality
of Electoral Exclusions will be published by Oxford University Press/UK in
summer 2014. Is the franchise really a basic moral right? Is the exclusion of
children and the mentally impaired justified? Is nationality a relevant factor in deciding the composition of the electorate? Should felons be enfranchised? Professor López-Guerra’s book provides unconventional answers
to these fundamental questions in the theory and practice of representative
systems. In addition, he is coediting Rationality, Democracy, and Justice: The
Legacy of Jon Elster, to be published by Cambridge University Press. Professor López-Guerra is currently writing about the ethics of immigration and
the moral obligations of public officials. He received his Licenciado (BA) in
Political Science from Universidad Iberoamerica in Mexico City and MA
and PhD in Political Science from Columbia University.
Janai S. Nelson is Professor of Law, Associate Dean for
Faculty Scholarship, and Associate Director of the Ronald H. Brown Center for Civil Rights and Economic
Development at St. John’s University School of Law.
Professor Nelson’s scholarship centers on domestic and
comparative election law, race, and democratic theory.
In addition to conducting research on election law and voting rights issues,
she teaches Election Law and Political Participation, Comparative Election
Law, Voting Rights, Professional Responsibility, and Constitutional Law.
Prior to joining St. John’s, Professor Nelson was a Fulbright Scholar at the
Legal Resources Center in Accra, Ghana, and Director of Political Participation at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF),
where she oversaw all voting-related litigation and matters, and litigated
voting rights and redistricting cases. She has published on issues of domestic and comparative election law, democracy, race, and criminal justice.
­Professor Nelson has appeared as an election law expert on CNN, InsideOut, public radio, and other media. She regularly speaks at conferences and
symposia nationwide. Professor Nelson was named in 2013 to Lawyers of
Color’s 50 Under 50 List, recognizing the most influential minority law
professors in the nation. She was the recipient of the 2013 Derrick A. Bell
Award from the American Association of Law Schools (AALS) Section on
Minority Groups. Professor Nelson received a BA from New York University and JD from UCLA School of Law.
The Vote: When Does Suffrage Become Universal? | 7
PERSPECTIVES
on
PROGRAM THEME
The Vote:
When Does Suffrage Become Universal?
Universal Suffrage—A Cultural Universal
Xavier Marquez
The most striking thing . . . is how complete is the shift between the world
of the eighteenth century, where politics was structured around norms of
hereditary selection, and today’s world, where politics everywhere is structured around electoral norms. . . . The magnitude of the shift is staggering.
The number of countries that do not recognize a norm of universal suffrage is tiny: less than 6% of all countries. . . . Universal suffrage is about
as close to a cultural universal today as these things get. . . . To be sure,
the fact that a norm is publicly recognized—is enshrined in constitutions
and given lip service in other ways—does not mean that it is actually
very meaningful. The “legitimacy” of the norm . . . does not mean that
the norm will be followed, or that it will affect power structures to any
significant extent.
Abandoned Footnotes: The Great Norm Shift and the Triumph of Universal Suffrage:
A Very Short Quantitative History of Political Regimes (September 11, 2012)
Essential Relationship Between Suffrage and Democracy
Janai S. Nelson
Constitutional text and government action are at times discordant in
important ways. This discrepancy occurs in both mature and emerging
democracies. It can result in the underenforcement of constitutional norms
and implicate the rule of law. When the constitutional norm involves the
8 | Leon Jaworski Public Programs
right to vote, the gap between constitutions and governance inevitably
triggers concerns about democracy as well.
“Fair Measure of the Right to Vote: A Comparative Perspective on Voting Rights Enforcement
in a Maturing Democracy,” Cardozo Journal of International and Comparative Law (2010)
Universal Suffrage Undefinable in the Absolute
Georges Vedel
There is no good definition of universal suffrage for the excellent reason
that it is undefinable in the absolute. It can only be defined through its
opposition to censitary [tax or property-qualified], aristocratic, or capacitive [intellectual-capacity qualified] suffrage. Still, in democracies, even
when neither children nor foreigners nor certain convicts vote, we still
recognize these as countries with universal suffrage.
Manuel Elementaire de Droit Constitutionnel (1949)
No Will of Their Own
William Blackstone
The true reason of requiring any qualification with regard to property in
voters is to exclude such persons as are in so mean a situation that they
are esteemed to have no will of their own. If these persons had votes,
they would be tempted to dispose of them under some undue influence or
other. This would give a great, an artful, or a wealthy man a larger share
in elections than is consistent with general liberty. If it were probable that
every man would give his vote freely and without influence of any kind,
then, upon the true theory and genuine principles of liberty, every member of the community, however poor, should have a vote in electing these
delegates, to whose charge is committed the disposal of his property, his
liberty, and his life.
Commentaries on the Laws of England, Book 1, Chapter 2 (1765)
The Vote: When Does Suffrage Become Universal? | 9
An Immediate Choice By the People
James Madison
The Constitutional Convention considered several methods of choosing the President. Referring to himself in the third person, Madison summarizes his own
speech:
He [Madison] was disposed for these reasons to refer the appointment to some other Source. The people at large was in his opinion
the fittest in itself. It would be as likely as any that could be devised
to produce an Executive Magistrate of distinguished Character. The
people generally could only know and vote for some Citizen whose
merits had rendered him an object of general attention & esteem.
There was one difficulty however of a serious nature attending an
immediate choice by the people. The right of suffrage was much
more diffusive in the Northern than the Southern States; and the
latter could have no influence in the election on the score of the
Negroes. The substitution of electors obviated this difficulty and
seemed on the whole to be liable to the fewest objections.
The Records of the Federal Convention (1787)
Neither Linear Nor Uncontested
Alexander Keyssar
At its birth, the United States was not a democratic nation—far from
it. The very word “democracy” had pejorative overtones, summoning up
images of disorder, government by the unfit, even mob rule. In practice,
moreover, relatively few of the new nation’s inhabitants were able to participate in elections: among the excluded were most African Americans,
Native Americans, women, men who had not attained their majority, and
adult white males who did not own land. . . . To be sure, the nation’s
political culture and political institutions did become more democratic,
and between the American Revolution and the middle of the nineteenth
century. . . . [t]he idea of democracy became widespread during these
years, the word itself more positive, even celebratory. Owing in part to
these shifting ideals and beliefs—and also because of the economic and
military needs, changes in the social structure, and the emergence of competitive political parties—the franchise was broadened throughout the
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United States. By 1850, voting was a far more commonplace activity than
it had been in 1800. Yet the gains were limited. . . . The American polity
may have been set on an unmistakably democratic course during the first
half of the nineteenth century, but the United States in 1850 stood a long
way from “universal suffrage.” . . . Change was neither linear nor uncontested: the sources of democratization were complex and the right to vote
was itself a prominent political issue throughout the period.
The Right to Vote: The Contested History of Democracy in the United States (2000)
Ruin of Democracy and Liberty
François Guizot
I am, for my part, a decided enemy of universal suffrage. I look upon it as
the ruin of democracy and liberty. If I needed proof I would have it under
my very eyes; I will not elucidate. However, I will permit myself to say,
with all the respect I have for a great country and a great government, that
the inner danger, the social danger by which the United States appears
menaced is due especially to universal suffrage; it is that which makes
them run the risk of seeing their real liberties, the liberties of everybody,
compromised, as well as the inner order of their society.
Speech of February 15, 1842 (from Fordham University Modern History Sourcebook)
The Sovereignty of the People in America
Alexis de Tocqueville
When you want to talk about the political laws of the United States, you
must always begin with the dogma of the sovereignty of the people. The
principle of the sovereignty of the people, which is more or less always
found at the base of nearly all human institutions, ordinarily remains there
as if buried. It is obeyed without being recognized, or if sometimes it happens, for a moment, to be brought into the full light of day, people soon
rush to push it back into the shadows of the sanctuary. . . . In America,
the principle of the sovereignty of the people is not hidden or sterile as it
is in certain nations [a vain show and a false principle as among certain
others; it is a legal and omnipotent fact that rules the entire society; that
The Vote: When Does Suffrage Become Universal? | 11
spreads freely and reaches its fullest consequences without obstacles]; it
is ­recognized by the mores, proclaimed by the laws; it spreads freely and
reaches its fullest consequences without obstacles. If there is a single country in the world where the true value of the dogma of the sovereignty of
the people can hope to be appreciated, where its application to the affairs
of society can be studied and where its advantages and dangers can be
judged, that country is assuredly America.
Democracy in America, vol. I (1835)
The Electoral Privilege
John Stuart Mill
No arrangement of the suffrage, therefore, can be permanently satisfactory in which any person or class is peremptorily excluded—in which the
electoral privilege is not open to all persons of full age who desire to obtain
it. There are, however, certain exclusions, required by positive reasons,
which do not conflict with this principle, and which, though an evil in
themselves, are only to be got rid of by the cessation of the state of things
which requires them. I regard it as wholly inadmissible that any person
should participate in the suffrage without being able to read, write, and, I
will add, perform the common operations of arithmetic. . . . If society has
neglected to discharge two solemn obligations, the more important and
more fundamental of the two must be fulfilled first; universal teaching
must precede universal enfranchisement.
Considerations on Representative Government (1861)
Electoral Voice for the Homeless
Man Ho Kam
Voters in New Delhi cast ballots in India’s general election. For the first
time ever, homeless people in the Indian capital were also able to participate. Officially, there are around 60,000 homeless people living on
the streets of New Delhi. However, organisations that help them believe
the number is more than 150,000. Excluded from politics until now,
thousands of them are now able to cast their votes during the legislative
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elections. . . . Sanjay Kumar works for Aashray Adhikar Abhiyan, one
of the NGOs working with New Delhi authorities to register homeless
people on electoral rolls: “These people already live on the margins of
society, so we wanted to give them a chance to express themselves; if they
don’t have a voice, people won’t worry about their fate.”
“New Delhi’s homeless cast their votes for the first time,” France 24 (April 11, 2014)
Our Demand for Suffrage
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, et al.
To the Senate and the House of Representatives:
The undersigned, Women of the United States, respectfully ask an
amendment of the Constitution that shall prohibit the several States
from disfranchising any of their citizens on the ground of sex. In
making our demand for Suffrage, we would call your attention to the
fact that we represent fifteen million people—one half of the entire
population of the country—intelligent, virtuous, native-born American citizens; and yet stand outside the pale of public recognition. The
Constitution classes us as “free people,” and counts us whole persons
in the basis of representation; and yet are we governed without our
consent, compelled to pay taxes without appeal, and punished for
violations of law without choice of judge or juror. The experience of
all ages, the Declarations of the Fathers, the Statute Laws of our own
day, and the fearful revolution through which we have just passed,
all prove the uncertain tenure of life, liberty and property so long as
the ballot—the only weapon of self-protection—is not in the hand
of every citizen. Therefore, as you are now amending the Constitution, and, in harmony with advancing civilization, placing new safeguards round the individual rights of four millions of emancipated
slaves, we ask that you extend the right of Suffrage to Women—the
only remaining class of disfranchised citizens—and thus fulfil your
Constitutional obligation “to Guarantee to every State in the Union
a Republican form of Government.”
A Petition for Universal Suffrage (January 29, 1866)
The Vote: When Does Suffrage Become Universal? | 13
Conferring Citizenship, But Not Suffrage
Morrison Waite
No new state has ever been admitted to the Union which has conferred
the right of suffrage upon women, and this has never been considered a
valid objection to her admission. . . . Besides this, citizenship has not in
all cases been made a condition precedent to the enjoyment of the right of
suffrage. Thus, in Missouri, persons of foreign birth, who have declared
their intention to become citizens of the United States, may under certain
circumstances vote. The same provision is to be found in the constitutions
of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Minnesota,
and Texas. Certainly, if the courts can consider any question settled, this
is one. For nearly ninety years the people have acted upon the idea that the
Constitution, when it conferred citizenship, did not necessarily confer the
right of suffrage. If uniform practice long continued can settle the construction of so important an instrument as the Constitution of the United
States confessedly is, most certainly it has been done here. Our province is
to decide what the law is, not to declare what it should be. We have given
this case the careful consideration its importance demands. If the law is
wrong, it ought to be changed; but the power for that is not with us.
Opinion of the U.S. Supreme Court, Minor v. Hapersett (1875)
Prisoners’ Voting an Emotive Subject
Lady Brenda Hale
Seven Supreme Court justices in London dismissed challenges brought by Peter
Chester and George McGeoch, who have been fighting for the right to vote while
behind bars. . . . Lady Hale, Deputy President of the Supreme Court, said:
“Prisoners’ voting is an emotive subject. Some people feel very strongly
that prisoners should not be allowed to vote. And public opinion polls
indicate that most people share that view.” There is still a “substantial
majority against it,” she said, adding, “It is not surprising therefore that
in February 2011, elected Parliamentarians also voted overwhelmingly
against any relaxation of the present law. In such circumstances, it is
incumbent upon the courts to tread delicately. Of course, in any modern
democracy, the views of the public and the Parliamentarians cannot be the
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end of the story. Democracy is about more than respecting the views of the
majority. It is also about safeguarding the rights of minorities, including
unpopular minorities.”
“Ruling ‘a victory for common sense,’” Express & Star (October 16, 2013)
The Full Measure of Their Citizenship
Eric Holder
The history of felony disenfranchisement dates to a time when these policies were employed not to improve public safety, but purely as punitive
measures—intended to stigmatize, shame, and shut out a person who had
been found guilty of a crime. Over the course of many decades—court by
court, state by state—Americans broadly rejected the colonial-era notion
that the commission of a crime should result in lifelong exclusion from
society. After Reconstruction, many Southern states enacted disenfranchisement schemes to specifically target African Americans and diminish
the electoral strength of newly freed populations. The resulting system
of unequal enforcement—and discriminatory application of the law—led
to a situation, in 1890, where 90 percent of the Southern prison population was black. And those swept up in this system too often had their
rights rescinded, their dignity diminished, and the full measure of their
citizenship revoked for the rest of their lives. They could not vote. In the
years since, thanks to the hard work, and the many sacrifices, of millions throughout our history, we’ve outlawed legal discrimination, ended
“separate but equal,” and confronted the evils of slavery and segregation.
Particularly during the last half-century, we’ve brought about historic
advances in the cause of civil rights. And we’ve secured critical protections like the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Yet—despite this remarkable, once-unimaginable progress—the vestiges,
and the direct effects, of outdated practices remain all too real. In many
states, felony disenfranchisement laws are still on the books. And the current scope of these policies is not only too significant to ignore—it is also
too unjust to tolerate.
Remarks on Criminal Justice Reform at Georgetown University Law Center
(February 11, 2014)
The Vote: When Does Suffrage Become Universal? | 15
Rejoining the Law-Abiding Community
Roger Clegg
We don’t let everyone vote—not children or noncitizens or the mentally
incompetent or criminals. We have certain minimum, objective standards
of responsibility and commitment to our laws that we require before
entrusting someone with a role in the sacred enterprise of self-government.
Or look at it this way: If you’re not willing to follow the law yourself, you
can’t demand a role in making it for everyone else. The right to vote can be
restored to felons, but it should be done carefully, on a case-by-case basis
after a person has shown that he or she has really turned over a new leaf.
At that point, the person can be praised and formally reenfranchised at
a solemn ceremony. That makes more sense and provides more incentive
for rejoining the law-abiding community than wordlessly and automatically letting someone vote on the day he walks out of prison. After all, the
unfortunate truth is that nowadays most people who walk out of prison
will be walking back in. And it is important that we not allow people to
vote illegally, because this cancels out a legitimate voter’s vote, as surely as
if that voter had not been allowed to vote at all.
Prepared for ABA Leon Jaworski Public Program (2014)
The Meaning of Universal Suffrage
V. V. Kravchenko
Universal Suffrage: a system of electoral rights under which the right to
participate in elections to representative bodies is granted to all citizens
who have reached the age established by the law without any electoral
qualifications whatsoever. Universal suffrage—one of the major principles
of electoral rights which determines the conditions of citizens’ electoral
rights and the degree of democracy of a given society—has a very pronounced class character. The meaning of universal suffrage is different
in socialist and bourgeois societies. According to the Constitution of
the USSR (art. 135), universal suffrage means that all citizens who have
reached the age of 18—regardless of their race or nationality, sex, religion,
educational or residential qualifications, social origin, property status, or
past activities—have the right to participate in elections to all the representative bodies of state power. Women enjoy the same rights to vote and
be elected as men, and citizens in the armed forces have the same rights to
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vote and be elected as all other citizens. . . . Only persons who have been
declared legally insane do not have the right to vote. Before the adoption
of the Constitution of the USSR of 1936, representatives of the exploiting
classes were denied suffrage. This temporary limitation was made necessary by the bitter class struggle. . . . The constitutions of the majority of
bourgeois states proclaim universal suffrage. However, because of a whole
system of limitations (qualifications) and various reservations and amendments provided for in the legislation itself, large numbers of voters—­
primarily representatives of the toiling people, soldiers, and women—are
barred from participation in elections.
The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979)
The Meaning of Full Democracy
Tony Cheung
Some Hongkongers may be confused about the meaning of full democracy, a leading Beijing loyalist [Maria Tam Wai-chu] said yesterday. And
a mainland academic said a vote for hand-picked candidates would still
deliver universal suffrage. Peking University law school professor Wang
Lei told a forum in Hong Kong that the chief executive could be deemed
elected by universal suffrage in 2017 as long as there were no “unreasonable restrictions” on the right to vote. He ruled out any notion of the
public nominating chief executive candidates, as demanded by many pandemocrats. . . . But senior counsel and Civic Party lawmaker Ronny Tong
Ka-wah disagreed. . . . “Wang might not have a clear understanding of
Hong Kong’s situation, because all he’s doing is insisting on the legal perspective—that only the nominating committee can nominate,” Tong said.
On the extent of the committee’s power, he said that while the right to
nominate need not be universal and equal, it must be “reasonable” because
“citizens’ right to vote and be elected could be weakened by any unreasonable restriction in the nominating process.” Tong suggested that Hongkongers have a say in putting forward candidates rather than leaving the
choice to the nominating committee.
“Universal suffrage not same as direct election, Maria Tam tells city,” (South China Morning
Post, February 16, 2014)
The Vote: When Does Suffrage Become Universal? | 17
Thinking Critically About the Right to Vote
Claudio López-Guerra
The denial of voting rights to certain types of persons continues to be a
moral problem of practical significance. The disenfranchisement of persons with mental impairments, minors, noncitizen residents, nonresident
citizens, and criminal offenders is a matter of controversy in many countries around the world. How should we think morally about electoral
exclusions? What should we conclude about these particular cases? On the
conventional view, the right to vote is a basic moral right, and current controversies are merely about discovering its boundaries. Is this the correct
view? Surprisingly, political philosophers have failed to submit the right
to vote and universal suffrage to serious critical scrutiny. That voting is a
fundamental right, and that some familiar exclusions are nevertheless justified, is merely taken for granted in academic and political discourse. In
the times when the franchise was wrongly denied on the basis of entirely
arbitrary factors (such as race and gender) the rhetoric of voting as a basic
right might have been useful. Today, however, failing to think critically
about the right to vote might, paradoxically, come at the price of ignoring
other, less obvious instances of unjustified exclusions.
Prepared for ABA Leon Jaworski Public Program (2014)
No End of It
John Adams
It is dangerous to open So fruitfull a Source of Controversy and Altercation, as would be opened by attempting to alter the Qualifications of
Voters. There will be no End of it. New Claims will arise. Women will
demand a Vote. Lads from 12 to 21 will think their Rights not enough
attended to, and every Man, who has not a Farthing, will demand an
equal Voice with any other in all Acts of State. It tends to confound and
destroy all Distinctions, and prostrate all Ranks, to one common Levell.
John Adams to James Sullivan (May 26, 1776) from The Founders’ Constitution, Ch. 13,
Document 10)
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Program Partners
ABA Standing Committee on Public Education mobilizes the resources of
the American Bar Association to promote public understanding of law
and the legal profession.
Federation of State Humanities Councils is the membership and advocacy
organization of the 56 state and territorial humanities organizations.
League of Women Voters of the United States encourages the informed and
active participation of citizens in government, works to increase understanding of major public policy issues, and influences public policy through
education and advocacy.
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, established by an act of
Congress in 1968 as our nation’s official living memorial to the 28th president, is a nonpartisan institute for advanced study and a neutral forum for
open, serious, and informed dialogue.
d
About Leon Jaworski
As president of the ABA in 1971, Leon Jaworski established
the special committee that was the genesis of the Association’s Division for Public Education. In 1983, a bequest from
his estate generously established the Leon Jaworski Fund for
Public Education, which continues to support annual public programs,
such as this one, devoted to furthering public understanding of law and
the legal system.
The Vote: When Does Suffrage Become Universal? | 19
Standing Committee on Public Education
Kim Askew, Chair
Pauline Weaver, National Law Day Chair
Cory M. Amron
Amelia Boss
Jaime Hawk
Leslie Ann Hayashi
Angela M. Hinton
Marvin D. Infinger
A. Thomas Levin
Kent D. Lollis
Robert Paolini
Walter Sutton
David G. Swenson
Marna S. Tucker
Stephen J. Wermiel
Advisory Commission
Aggie Alvez
Ruthe Catolico Ashley
Joseph F. Baca
Marshall Croddy
Leslie C. Francis
Debra Jenece Gammons
Gene Koo
Nancy Kranich
Craig Livermore
Elisabeth MacNamara
Karen Birgam Martin
Rhoda Shear Neft
Karl Shoemaker
Director, Division for Public Education
Mabel C. McKinney-Browning
Series Director
Howard F. Kaplan
www.lawday.org
(Jaworski Public Programs)