Day 13: From 18 to 21 – Countdown to November 3rd | Reflections on Voter Access

13 Days Remaining

The 26th Amendment was passed on July 1st of 1971. It reads as such:

“Section 1: The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.”

The previous age at which young adults could exercise their constitutional right to vote was 21, but a movement in the midst of a controversial and devastating war impacted change.

At the time of the 26th Amendment’s ratification, the Vietnam War had been raging for sixteen years, with the United States’ on the ground for six. The country had gone from war to war, and asked its citizens to keep momentum alive, even as its people were dying. The country was consumed with many critical movements for basic human rights, and young people were amid the forefront of these calls for change. They were being asked to fight for a country that would not even allow their voices to be heard. This ignited outcry from youth of every race. 

Young people took to the streets, and shouted loud enough for Congress to hear. The words that have memorialized themselves in American consciousness are those that became the mantra of the anti-war movement: Old enough to fight, old enough to vote.

Renowned Professor of History, Christian Appy, so poignantly put to words those feelings of the American youth at the time; “most of the Americans who fought in Vietnam were powerless, working-class teenagers sent to fight an undeclared war by presidents for whom they were not even eligible to vote.”

Young men from all races were being drafted to fight and die for their country. As tensions increased on the battlefield and between the fighting countries, so too did tensions back home. College campuses were electrified with anti-war protests, and it became impossible for the country’s leaders to ignore.

In March of 1970, Senator Edward (Ted) Kennedy, brother of former president, John F. Kennedy, said before the Senate subcommittee on constitutional amendments, “The well-known proposition—’old enough to fight, old enough to vote’—deserves special mention… About 30 percent of our forces in Vietnam are under 21. Over 19,000, or almost half, of those who have died in action there were under 21. Can we really maintain that these young men did not deserve the right to vote?”

As we approach this crucial election on November 3rd, we must look at the statistics of voter turnout. The New York Times found that fewer than half of Americans 18 to 29 voted in the 2016 presidential election. Through the 26th Amendment, young adults have the right to vote. We must improve voter access, then, to allow this right to be exercised.