Voting Pet Peeve

By Angel Thompson Georges

I've got a pet peeve. Well, actually I have a few, but the one that is on my mind is apathy. Apathy, by definition is a lack of feeling, emotion, interest or concern. November 4^th is Election Day! Right wing, left wing, chicken wing, I don't care, Go Vote!

Two things that I have been waiting most of my life for, a woman or a minority on a major party ticket, are happening this year. Amazingly they aren't even on the same one! The last time anything like this happened was back in 1984, long before I was old enough to vote. I was 12 when Walter Mondale selected Geraldine Ferraro to be his running mate. With a novice understanding of the way politics work, I was sure this meant there would be a woman or a minority on the ticket every presidential election thereafter. I never thought I would have to wait five presidential elections before it happened again. People, we are on the verge of a historical election! Who knows when you will get the chance to vote for candidates like these again?! Go participate in a historical event! Go vote!

In 1776 only white men with property had the right to vote (that is unless they were Catholic, Jewish or Quaker). It wasn't until 1856 that the last state dropped the property qualifications. In 1869 the Fifteenth Amendment gave African American men the right to vote, but by 1940 only 3% of African Americans in the south were even registered to vote. In 1882 Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act denying citizenship and voting rights to Chinese Americans. It was finally repealed in 1943, some 60 years later. First generation Japanese Americans had to wait until 1952. It took 72 years of activism between when voting rights for women were proposed in 1848 at the Seneca Falls Woman's Rights Convention, and when the 19^th Amendment was ratified. Despite the passage of the Indian Citizenship Act in 1924, many state laws effectively barred Native Americans from voting until 1948. Chances are somebody had to put up a fight for you to have the right. Honor your foremothers and forefathers. Go vote!

Disillusioned with the political process? Me too. Does my vote make a difference? Does my voice really count? To be honest, I'm not 100% sure it does. What I am sure of is that by fulfilling my responsibility, pulling the curtain and casting my vote, I have done my part and therefore retain my right to complain. If the one I vote for wins, I have a right to hold them accountable. If the other party wins, I have the right to hold them accountable too. And when whoever wins does something I don't like, by having voted, I feel I have earned the right to voice an opinion about it. If history past and in the making aren't enough to overcome apathy, then I implore, just go vote so you'll have better grounds to complain.