"Let us vote!" : youth voting rights and the 26th amendment /
""Let Us Vote" tells the story of the multifaceted endeavor to achieve youth voting rights in the United States. Over a thirty-year period from World War II to the early 1970s, Americans, old and young, Democrat and Republican, in politics and culture built a movement and momentum for...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Licensed eBooks |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
New York, N.Y. :
NYU Press,
2021.
|
| Online Access: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/jj.1094279 |
| Summary: | ""Let Us Vote" tells the story of the multifaceted endeavor to achieve youth voting rights in the United States. Over a thirty-year period from World War II to the early 1970s, Americans, old and young, Democrat and Republican, in politics and culture built a movement and momentum for the 26th Amendment to the US Constitution. This amendment gave the right to vote to 18, 19, and 20-year olds in 1971, and it was the last time that the United States significantly expanded voting rights. The 26th Amendment means a major expansion of American democracy came right end of "the sixties." Progress toward achieving youth suffrage built on the decade's many developments, most importantly the movement and legislation for African-American civil and voting rights. This story illuminates the process of achieving political change, with the convergence of "top-down" initiative and "bottom-up" mobilization, coalition-building, multiple arguments, and strategic flexibility leading to success. Supporters came from a broad, bipartisan group of Americans and achieved a constitutional amendment that benefited every constituency in the nation. With the 50th anniversary of this important constitutional amendment this year [2021], and as calls for lowering the voting age to sixteen multiply today within the context of climate crisis, gun violence, and police brutality-all of which affect young people disproportionately-the 26th Amendment deserves our attention, application, and appreciation"-- |
|---|---|
| Physical Description: | 1 online resource (x, 371 pages ): illustrations. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| ISBN: | 9781479811335 1479811335 9781479811328 1479811327 |