“I’ve Got a Little List”
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Democrats Want to Lower the Voting Age
I’ve got a little list.
by George Liebmann
August 16, 2024, 10:30 AM
Yaran/Shutterstock
Today’s focus on Donald Trump and Kamala Harris should not obscure the contest for control of Congress.
Article I, Section 1 of the Constitution unambiguously declares: “All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States.” However, neither Republican advocates of a unitary presidency nor Democratic supporters of a living Constitution appear to have read this far in the nation’s founding document. (READ MORE: Is Walz Worse Than Newsom?)
Since I do not aspire to the powers of the president, but to those of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Mikado, I here proclaim that like him:
As some day it may happen that a victim must be found
I’ve got a little list, I’ve got a little list
Of society offenders who might well be underground,
And who never would be missed, who never would be missed
The Mikado list included:
Apologetic statesmen of a compromising kind
and:
The idiot who praises with enthusiastic tone
All centuries but this, and every country but his own.
To this admirable listing, we may add the adherents of an organization known as Generation Citizen, supported by among others the Bezos Family Foundation, the Jennifer and Allan Soros Fund, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, which sponsor an advocacy group called Vote 16 USA agitating for a reduction in the voting age to 16 (but not, of course, in the age of criminal responsibility. Instead ‘liberals’ are quick to remind that brains do not fully mature until age 25). (READ MORE: Kamala and Her Price-Control Scheme Straight Outta Berkeley)
The efforts of this group to reduce the voting age in California primary elections to 17, surprisingly failed in a 2020 referendum in that state by 56 percent.
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi endorsed a 16-year-old national voting age on the revealing ground that, “I think it’s really important to capture kids when they’re in high school when they’re interested in all of this when they’re learning about the government to be able to vote.”
This is despite the fact that less than ever before can it be said, of teenagers, in Emerson’s words, that “they do not postpone life, but live already.” It was because of immaturity and inexperience that Chancellor Bruning of Germany in 1932 and Chancellor Schushnigg of Austria in 1937 urged that the voting age be raised to 25 to combat their country’s Nazis. (READ MORE: Republicans Must Make a Laser-Focused, Issues-Based Case to the People)
Thus we may add to the Mikado’s list the 125 Democrats who in a House roll call vote on March 3, 2021, supported a federal voting age of 16:
YEAS 125:
Adams
Auchincloss
Bass
Beatty
Beyer
Blumenauer
Blunt Rochester
Bonamici
Bowman
Boyle, Brendan F.
Brown
Brownley
Bush
Carbajal
Carson
Casten
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Chu
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Cleaver
Clyburn
Cooper
Correa
Crist
Davis, Danny K.
DeFazio
DelBene
Delgado
DeSaulnier
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Escobar
Eshoo
Espaillat
Evans
Foster
Frankel, Lois
Gallego
García (IL)
Golden
Gomez
Gonzalez, Vicente
Green, Al (TX)
Grijalva
Haaland
Hastings
Hayes
Higgins (NY)
Jackson Lee
Jacobs (CA)
Jayapal
Johnson (TX)
Jones
Kahele
Khanna
Kildee
Kilmer
Kim (NJ)
Kirkpatrick
Lamb
Langevin
Lee (CA)
Lee (NV)
Leger Fernandez
Levin (CA)
Levin (MI)
Lieu
Lowenthal
Malinowski
Maloney, Sean
McGovern
Meng
Moulton
Murphy (FL)
Neal
Neguse
Newman
Ocasio-Cortez
Omar
Pallone
Panetta
Pascrell
Payne
Phillips
Pingree
Pocan
Pressley
Price (NC)
Quigley
Raskin
Rice (NY)
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan
Schakowsky
Schiff
Sewell
Smith (WA)
Soto
Speier
Stanton
Strickland
Swalwell
Takano
Thompson (MS)
Tlaib
Tonko
Torres (NY)
Trahan
Underwood
Vargas
Velázquez
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Watson Coleman
Welch
Williams (GA)
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
Posted in: Culture Wars, Judiciary and Legal Issues, State and Local Politics, The Right, Urban Affairs