IF 16-YEAR-OLDS CAN VOTE, SHOULDN’T THEY ALSO FACE CONSEQUENCES OF CRIME?
A troubling double standard is created by assuming maturity in only one area
There are a number of good reasons to keep the voting age at 18, but that’s not the direction city council is going.
Council was won over by various arguments put forward by the Edmonton Youth Council in favour of lowering the voting age to 16 for civic and public school board elections.
A final vote is needed, but council is almost certainly going to join with the youth council to lobby the provincial government for lowering the voting age.
Why take such a step? As the youth council writes in its letter to Rachel Notley’s NDP government:
The youth council surveyed 16,006 students and 98.7 per cent supported the idea. Sixteen-yearolds can use city roads, facilities and transit. They can drive, move out on their own, join the army reserves and can be parents. This means, according to the youth council, “through being able to handle these responsibilities youth have shown not only that they are ready, but that they are competent in municipal issues.” The voting age has already been lowered in Austria, Norway and Scotland, so we won’t be the first. Research shows higher voter turnout for 16- and 17-year-olds than for 18-to-24-year-olds, and it also has “shown that when one votes in their first election, they are more likely to become a lifelong voter.”
Research from one U.S. professor was also quoted, stating that 16-year-olds, but not anyone younger than that, are sufficiently competent to vote as they “manifest levels of development in each quality of citizenship (membership, concern for rights, and participation in society) that are approximately the same as those apparent in young American adults who are allowed to vote.”
In supporting this idea, many councillors were impressed with the notion that this would create the habit of voting and get more people out to vote. But this strikes me as a weak rationale.
I doubt the premise that, over time, significantly greater numbers of Edmontonians will vote if they first vote when they’re 16 or 17.
Second, while politicians may take it as a sign of end times if regular folks tune them out and if large numbers don’t vote, that may be a sign that folks are indifferent to politics, which they have every right to be, or that they’re content with the status quo.
As for the other arguments, the fact that 16-year-olds can take the bus to the local recreation centre does nothing to persuade me that they should be able to vote, nor does the fact that they can have babies.
And while a few progressive countries have decided to go this route, so has North Korea, where the voting age is 17. Should we follow Kim Jong-UN’s lead?
It’s also worth noting that while the youth council consulted with high schoolers about this, city council didn’t ask the rest of us what we think. Essentially, council will now push to change voting rights without any comprehensive input from actual voters or any attempt to seek out opposing expert viewpoints.
Most troubling is the double standard that this change will bring about. On the one hand, 16- and 17-year-olds are being told, yes, you’re mature and adult enough to vote. But when 16- and 17-year-olds commit a crime, there’s an entirely different message from government: “Young people lack the maturity of adults.” That line comes from a federal Justice Department document explaining the rationale for the Youth Criminal Justice Act, where those under the age of 18 are treated much differently and more leniently under the law.
The day that I hear politicians passionately argue that 16-yearolds are now so mature that the Youth Criminal Justice Act is no longer needed, well, I might then accept the notion that they are also mature enough to vote. But I don’t expect that day to come because young people aren’t suddenly maturing more rapidly.
In other spheres of life, the lack of maturity among teenagers is why those under 18 can’t sign legally binding contracts and it’s why parents are legally bound to care for their children until they turn 18.
Voting is a serious and weighty matter, with significant consequences for our society.
So when you’re fully and legally responsible for your own room and board, when you’re old enough to face the full consequences of any crime you commit, when you’re old enough to fully understand and live with the consequences of a legal contract, that’s when you’ve taken on enough responsibility to also receive the adult right to vote.
But when 16and 17-year-olds commit a crime, there’s an entirely different message from government: ‘Young people lack the maturity of adults.’