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Voting

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Argumentative Essay
Should all citizens be required by law to vote in Australia?

All citizens should be compelled by law to vote in Australia.

In Australia today it is mandatory to be on the electoral roll and to vote at federal and state elections for all citizens over eighteen years of age. However, it has not always been the case. At the beginning of the 20th century most men and women were eligible to vote except for indigenous people who were excluded. Following poor voter turnout in a previous election, compulsory voting was introduced in 1924. In 1962 Indigenous people gained the right to vote and it was made compulsory for them in 1984. In 1973 the voting age was changed from twenty-one to eighteen (Skwirk , 2014). The following discussion will argue that the benefits of compulsory voting far outweigh the disadvantages.

In our society we have certain obligations like paying taxes, compulsory education and jury duty. Compulsory voting is just another civic duty much less onerous than any of the above. Australia is one of only eleven countries to enforce participation in elections. A 94% voter turnout for the last federal election compared favourably to 65% in the 2010 United Kingdom election and 57% in the 2012 United States presidential election (Padmanabhan, 2015). The argument that compulsory voting is incompatible with democratic government obviously does not apply to Australia that is considered one of the most transparent, representative and least corrupt nations of the world (White, 2013). The whole point of freedom is that everyone has a say and a responsibility to voice their opinion. Fifty per cent or less voter turnout is not a democracy. Unethical charismatic candidates may able to attract a large following and distort the will of the general public. When only a minority of people vote, it reduces the power of lobby groups and

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