The Value of a Vote: Why Californian Voters Should Vote Yes on Proposition 17
On November 3rd of this year, millions of United States citizens will be voting in what many have called “the most important election of our lifetime.” However, there will be more than five million people nationwide who are barred from voting because they are currently incarcerated, on probation, or on parole. In California, from people on parole alone, fifty thousand individuals will be denied from voting in this year’s election, and for many of these individuals, for many elections to come. Placing voting restrictions on people with felony convictions is deeply rooted in racism and unjustly allows for taxation without representation. If Proposition 17 is passed, it will help remedy these injustices by restoring the voting rights of people on parole for felony convictions. (1)
What is Proposition 17?
California propositions placed on the ballot are referendums or initiative measures that are offered to the voting public for a direct vote. Each election, California’s ballot includes several propositions, each of which was placed on the ballot through petitions signed by registered voters or by the California State Legislature. This year, the California State Legislature voted to include Proposition 17 to this year’s ballot for California’s residents to vote on whether voting rights will be reinstated for people on parole. A vote yes on Proposition 17 supports amending the California Constitution to allow those who are currently on parole for felony convictions the right to vote. A vote no on Proposition 17 opposes amending the California Constitution, continuing to deny the right to vote for those on parole for felony convictions. (2)In the upcoming election, California voters must consider the role the right to vote plays in democracy as they use their right to vote to determine if those with felony convictions should be allowed to participate in democracy in the same way.
Why Does Voting Matter?
While it is easy to see your vote as just one among millions, each vote truly does matter. Often times, decisions made within the government are made by our elected officials, instead of by direct vote where each person votes on every issue. Therefore, our right to vote is paramount because it is how we choose the leaders that will represent our ideas, interests, and communities. American human rights activist, Luong Ung, emphasizes the impact of a vote when she says, “Voting is not only our right — it is our power.” Voting has a profound effect on each of our lives because it is instrumental in creating, changing, and striking down laws. The power that a vote holds has been long recognized. It is precisely because of that power that the vote has been strategically withheld from marginalized people for centuries.
During the Constitutional Convention of 1787, the all-white male delegates of the states had the difficult decision of deciding how the number of representatives in the House of Representatives would be counted. The delegates ultimately decided that slaves living within the state would count towards the representation in the House of Representatives, despite the fact that did not have the right to vote. In a similar way, prisoners are counted in the U.S. Census which decides district lines and the number of members in the House of Representatives. Currently, the U.S. Census counts prisoners as residents of the districts that the prisons are located in, despite the fact that many of them are from urban areas. Due to the fact that prisons are usually in rural areas while the people within the prisons come from urban areas, this is unjust because white, rural areas gain more voting power than they would have if the prisoners were counted as members of their home districts. Though this issue is persistent today, wealthy white men have long been the gatekeepers of the right to vote, strategically denying the vote from those who threaten their positions of power. (3)
Women were not granted the right to vote until 1920, one hundred forty-four years after the birth of our democracy. Even then, this right only came after years of relentless advocacy from women. In 1848, the Seneca Fall Convention became the birthplace of the women’s suffrage movement. These suffragettes argued that they were not being recognized as full citizens if they could not vote. They asserted that because women are individuals with their own political identities, they should be able to express their opinions and have a voice in democracy through the vote. However, as the women’s suffrage movement continued to grow and gain popularity, women of color were cast aside. (4)
The women’s suffrage movement originated from the activism of the abolitionist movement, but the two ultimately diverged in their goals. At the outset, many people actively supported both platforms. However, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, two key women’s suffrage advocates, came to resent the fact that Black men had the right to vote while they still did not, ultimately breaking their alliance with the abolitionist movement. This placed women of color in a very awkward, in-between space. The racist ideologies present among the white leaders in the movement were clear in the way that they discussed the repulsiveness of not just men, but Black men, having the right to vote before themselves. The women’s suffrage movement became a movement of white women, rather than all women. Due to the dominance of this space and movement by white women, women of color were not able to exercise the right to vote for women of color was not achieved until many years after 1920. (5)
Five years after the 13th amendment proclaimed Black Americans free from slavery, the 15th amendment was ratified, allowing Black men the legal right to vote. However, white supremacists created barriers to stop Black men from exercising this right. This included literacy tests, grandfather clauses that excluded those whose ancestors had not voted during the 1860s, and poll taxes. This shows that these white supremacists were willing to go to great lengths to keep people from voting who may not have the same political interests as them. In 1965, Lyndon B. Johnson found it necessary to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which broke down these barriers put in place. As Lyndon B. Johnson states, “this right to vote is the basic right without which all others are meaningless. It gives people, people as individuals, control over their own destinies.” The struggles that disenfranchised people have been facing for so long to get equal voting rights is a testament to the political power that a vote allows for one to have. While today there are amendments in place that secure the right to vote for men and women of all races, white supremacy continues to create new ways to deny people of color political power. (6)
Modern Day Voter Disenfranchisement is Rooted in Racism
Today, mass incarceration disproportionately imprisons low-income people of color, further denying them their right to vote. The U.S. is home to just 5% of the world’s population yet holds 25% of the world’s prisoners. Black Americans are five times more likely than white people to be imprisoned, and in some states, the disparity increases to ten times more likely. In twelve states of the fifty states in the United States of America, Black Americans make up more than half of the prison population. Nationally, Black people make up just thirteen percent of the population. While this disparity is certainly unacceptable, this is exactly how our criminal legal system has been created. The system is meant to disenfranchise people who are low income and/or from minority demographics. The racism within the criminal legal system can be tied as far back as slavery and continues to affect people of color in the United States.
United States police forces evolved from slave patrols that had the role of returning escaped enslaved people, stopping uprisings, and punishing enslaved people. At their formation, the police force was a majority white, male, and expected to control Black people, immigrants, and the poor. Today, the police force operates to do the very same thing. Between the years 2014 and 2019, more than six thousand five hundred people have been killed by the police. The popular campaign #SayTheirNames brings attention to the countless people, often of color, who have been killed by the police. In addition, we see that immigration continues to be criminalized as Immigration Detention and Enforcement officers lock children in cages and separate parents from their children without justification. Furthermore, the police criminalize the homeless members of our communities by throwing away their belongings and citing them instead of offering much-needed resources. The criminal legal system, coupled with laws that restrict voting rights for those who have been convicted of crimes, only leads to further marginalization of low-income people and people of color.
When Did Felon Disenfranchisement Begin and Where is it Now?
The current restricting of voting rights for criminals began in 1792 when Kentucky became the first state to deny the right to vote for those who had committed crimes of bribery, perjury, forgery, or other high crimes as misdemeanors. As Black Americans became free and gained the right to vote, white supremacists used these laws to their advantage to further disenfranchise Black individuals in the United States. Today, nationwide, about 1 in 7 Black men are temporarily or permanently disenfranchised due to the current felon disenfranchisement laws. The only states that currently allow the right to vote for felons, even when they are in prison, are Maine and Vermont. The District of Columbia also allows its prisoners to vote. Florida, Kentucky, New Jersey, New York, Nevada, Colorado, and Louisiana have all expanded the right to vote for people with criminal convictions in just the past two years. Below you can see the current status of voter disenfranchisement in the United States. Despite the widespread felony disenfranchisement within our country, it is deeply out of line without our country’s values.
While the descriptions of the orange and blue states may seem very similar, they differ slightly as the orange states are more restrictive. Within the orange states, people who have been convicted of felonies are granted the right to vote only after they are no longer in prison, on parole, or on probation can vote. Within the blue states, people currently in prison cannot vote but anyone on parole, probation, or other supervision can vote. (7)
Endorsements and Opposition
There is a long list of endorsements for voting yes on Proposition 17, most notably John Legend, Governor Gavin Newsom, Senator Kamala Harris, Snoop Dogg, the California Democratic Party, and the ACLU. This is a large contrast to the short list of just two people in opposition to Proposition 17 including the Republic Party of California and State Senator Jim Nielson. This makes sense because, despite the long history of the powerful members of society denying marginalized populations political power, our country was founded on the values of engaging in politics as a way to shape our own lives. The resistance against Great Britain that led to the creation of the United States of America was rooted in the frustrations of citizens not being able to play a role in the political processes that dominated their lives. So we must question why we accept it for members of society that have been incarcerated? (8)
Some may argue that this is not in opposition to our countries values because these people have broken the law, so the situation is different. However, if we subscribe to the idea that prisons are the punishment for the transgressions of incarcerated people, then it does not make sense to further disenfranchise them and punish them twice. Especially when it is likely that these people were victims before they victimized others. (9) Often times they are victims of not just people, but of entire systems that have denied them social mobility and access to adequate resources.
However, instead of highlighting this fact, the narratives surrounding people with criminal convictions have painted them as monsters who are not deserving of humanity. This is clear from the fact that we are comfortable as a society making these people live in cages and depriving them of their basic human rights. This fear-mongering often leads people to raise the question of “What about the rapists and the murders?”
The current criminal legal system is not protecting humanity from rapists and murders. Currently, less than 230 out of every 1000 rapes are reported. On average, 9 of those will get referred to a prosecutor and only 5 of those people will be incarcerated. That means that our current system is allowing people who commit sexual violence to remain members of our communities without any recourse or rehabilitation efforts. In addition, less than sixty percent of all homicides were solved in 2016. Some of these murderers and rapists, like the Golden State killer, take decades to apprehend. So, it is paramount that we uncouple from the idea that the current system is the only way to solve our issues and that it is working at all. While allowing people on parole to vote will not stop all murders or acts of domestic or sexual violence from happening, it can play a role in decreasing the number.
Civic Engagement Helps, Not Hurts, Communities
Many people worry that if formerly incarcerated people who are on parole are able to vote, it will harm our communities. However, allowing these people to civically engage by voting actually makes it three times less likely that they will reenter the system. Civic engagement includes any activity that affects issues of public concern, such as voting and donating time or money to a community organization. This type of engagement not only helps build a stronger community but gives those engaging a sense of responsibility for their community. When people feel responsible for something and feel connected to their community, they will be less likely to commit crimes within their community because they understand more clearly the harm that their actions cause. After reentering the community, these formerly incarcerated people are expected to contribute to their communities but have no political power within their communities. It is fundamentally unfair to deny people their right to vote. Below, is a video that was used in the Yes on 17 campaign by Initiate Justice. It includes several testimonials from people currently on parole who would regain their right to vote if Proposition 17 was passed. (9)
This video highlights just how important the right to vote is for those who have had that right stripped from them. As Richie Reseda explained, members of the community that have had the right to vote taken from them are hyper-aware of the importance of that right. Hugo Gonzalez, who is shown in the video, is currently serving his community as a board member of the non-profit organization Initiate Justice, working and paying taxes, yet without Proposition 17 being passed he would never be able to vote again in California. This shows how unjust taking away the right to vote for those on parole is because this man has changed his life and is not giving back to his community, but up until the November 3rd election, when Proposition 17 was passed, he had no say in the politics that shaped his community. (10)
Barring Californians on parole from voting is taxation without representation rooted in white supremacy. While America was founded on the values that no citizen should be taxed without representation, we have seen powerful white men shut people of color out of the political arena to hold on to their power. Some may argue that they are opposed to formerly incarcerated people on parole voting for public safety reasons rather than racism, but we know that allowing these people to vote makes our communities safer, not more dangerous. On November 3rd, 2020, California decided to pass Proposition 17, reinstating voting rights for people on parole. While this is certainly a step in the right direction, we must remember that there are still several states across the nation where formerly incarcerated people cannot vote. (11)It is paramount that we fight for those in society who have been cast aside because it could very easily be one of us in their position, being silenced.