Jackson Free Press

June 8, 2005: New York City could become the first American city to lower its voting age to sixteen after Councilwoman Gale Brewer introduces her bill to lower the municipal voting age from 18 to 16 on Wednesday.

Originally proposed by the Future Voters of America Party, this measure is sponsored by Councilwoman Gale Brewer and will be introduced on June 8, 2005, at 1 p.m. at City Hall. Before the city council meeting, Councilwoman Brewer, FVAP and the National Youth Rights Association will hold a news conference on the front steps of city hall to introduce the issue. The news conference is scheduled to begin at 11:30 am.

Among those expected to be in attendance at the news conference is New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, as well as Alex Koroknay-Palicz, NYRA's national President.

NYRA-NYC endorses this legislation because the time is right for this historic breakthrough. At least 80% of high school students work before graduation. They pay taxes but have no say where those tax dollars go. They have a unique perspective on particular issues, including education, but have no input over crucial policy decisions. NYRA also believes there is substantial evidence to suggest lowering the voting age will increase voter turnout.

"Every election the media and politicians complain that more young people don't come out and vote," says NYRA-NYC President Ana Hevesi. "why then do we stop thousands of young people under 18 from voting when they really want to?"

NYRA-NYC encourages New York to join a growing worldwide movement to lower the voting age. Canada, Germany and the United Kingdom are all considering a lower voting age. In America, legislation to lower the voting age has been introduced in several states and communities. Now New York can become the first city to adopt a voting age of sixteen.

About NYRA
NYRA, founded in 1998, is a Washington D.C. based 501(c)(3) non-profit. Its mission is to promote awareness of the legal and civil rights of young people in the United States. NYRA has over 5,000 members and has been featured on CNN, Fox News, PBS, NPR, and in the New York Times, USA Today, Boston Globe, LA Times, Christian Science Monitor, Baltimore Sun and numerous other publications [including the Jackson Free Press. —ed.]

E-mail [e-mail missing]
Website: http://www.youthrights.org

Previous Commentsshow

I think this sounds like a great idea! We should push for it here in Mississippi, too. While we're at it, let's work on getting the drinking age back to 18 where it should be as well, instead of encouraging college students to sneak around and binge drink. They're old enough to go to war, they're old enough to legally drinkówhether they're on the military base or not.

DonnaLadd

Jun 6 2005

BTW, what's the legality of lowering the voting age? Can cities/states do this? Maybe if you do, you lose the chance of getting pork from the feds.

DonnaLadd

Jun 6 2005

Interesting news indeed, Donna. Here's an old post from a yahoo message board (long since dead) that I was on. She is a school teacher in Germany and active in the SPD Party politics (Socialist Part of Germany) -- but even by US standards she wouldn't be FAR Left "Battle of Seattle" type. Though as the name suggests, she is all for "mixed economy" social benefits. Incidentally, I started the thread by asking a question that on the surface would be HIGHLY repulsive - especially to Americans. I only did so to remind us all of a moral lesson. My question was "If we say some people are too stupid to vote, then shouldn't we accept with open arms the notion that only those with doctorates should have the right to vote? Just a thought" The German lady responded as such: We had a similar discussion here when the law was passed that youngsters at the age of 16 are allowed to vote for local councils (not BE elected, though). Many said that they were too young, too inexperienced. However, I have found out that they took their vote much more seriously than many adults. In school they were prepared for their first election, they worked through the different agandas of the different parties and many still said they felt that they were not able to give a responisble vote and thus abstained. This is much more than what I have seen from many adults. And yes, sometimes I feel frustrated about how public opinion can be shifted by little things. The fact that less and less people take the time to read good newspapers and that information has deteriorated to infotainment on TV is playing a big part in weird electoral results.

Philip

Jun 6 2005

BTW, what's the legality of lowering the voting age? Can cities/states do this? I'm not a lawyer, but I think states can. The constitution only prohibits states from denying the right to vote based on race, sex or religion, and it prohibits poll taxes. The XXVI amendment states that no citizen who is at least 18 years old can be denied the right to vote based on age, but it doesn't say younger citizens cannot vote.

Justin

Jun 7 2005

Cities could lower the voting age with enabling legislation from the state.

Justin

Jun 7 2005

What a wonderful idea. I'd love it if we could adopt that practice here. Cheers, TH

Tom Head

Jun 19 2005

We can't get the people who are registered now to vote! Now they're saying that if we just lower the age, all those 16 year olds are raring to vote? Uh... yeah. I'm not following the logic there.

Ironghost

Jun 20 2005