Felons and Voting Rights

Our discussion in class reminded me of an interesting opinion article I read in The Economist last week. I always like The Economist because it offers an international perspective on many of the things we take for granted in the U.S.

The most interesting part of the article, I thought, was the closing paragraph:

"Serving prisoners are not numerous enough to swing many elections. But once a government uses disenfranchisement as a sanction, it is tempted to take things further. Consider those American states where the suspension of prisoners’ votes has morphed into a lifelong ban: in Republican-controlled Florida, for instance, nearly a third of black men cannot vote—enough to have swung the 2000 presidential election. Even those who don’t care much about prisoners’ rights should be wary of elected officials exercising too much say over who makes up the electorate."

You can read the entire article here.