by Joelle Steele

Your country is what you make it by the way you vote. Yet most United States citizens don’t fully realize or understand what an incredible privilege it is to vote for our leaders. In the United States, every citizen of voting age has a right to vote, and this is very clearly stated in more than one Amendment in the Bill of Rights of our Constitution:

15th Amendment, Section 1. [Passed and Ratified by Congress in 1870.]. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

19th Amendment [Passed and Ratified by Congress in 1920.] The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

24th Amendment, Section 1. [Passed and Ratified by Congress in 1964.] The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay poll tax or other tax.

26th Amendment, Section 1. [Passed and Ratified by Congress in 1971.] 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.

Our leaders have long recognized the importance of the vote and they have used all their powers to set forth our voting rights in the Bill of Rights. Yet in the 2016 election, voter turnout was shamefully low. The following statistics are rounded off: Out of 240 million voting-age adults, only 157 million were registered to vote. And, of that 157 million, only 117 million voted.

This means that the leadership of all 323 million U.S. citizens (as of 2016) was determined by only 117 million voters – a mere 38 percent of the 240 million voting-age adults! Do you really want your life as a U.S. citizen to be determined by only 38 percent of all eligible voters? 

Here’s what happens when you don’t exercise your right to vote. It’s all about the Electoral College, which is not without its flaws. But that’s a topic for another time. The Electoral College consists of a group of 538 electors (the total number of senators and representatives in all the states). It determines the final outcome of an election based on the popular vote in each state. A candidate needs at least 270 of these electoral votes to win an election, and if you don’t vote, your state may not have enough popular votes to support your candidate of choice.

The number of electoral votes varies among the states. For example, Florida has 29 electors and Utah has only 6. So, if the popular vote in Florida is for John Smith, he gets 29 of the 538 electoral votes. If he wins the popular vote in Utah, he will only get 6 votes. So, the popular vote determines the outcome by way of the Electoral College.

The bottom line is this: YOU make the difference in the leadership of our country. Get registered now! Then carefully study the candidates – not their mud-slinging TV ads – to make sure they have the credentials for the job, and that they will do what benefits ALL citizens, the entire country, not just you and yours. And, when the time comes, mail in your ballot or get out to the polls and vote!