Date: Mon, 24 May 2004 09:49:44 +0100
Subject: Re: voting



Erik wrote

 > in my entire adult life i always went voting (in belgium it is 
compulsary voting)

And I think Jeremy also mentioned the compulsory voting in Australia.

People have taken direct action for the right to vote. For instance,
in the UK during the 19th Century there was a huge "chartist" movement,
with millions of activists, but divided between the "moral force" chartists
and the "physical force" chartists. In other words, there was general
agreement that some form of direct action was necessary, the disagreements
were about whether it had to be kept non-violent or not. In south Wales
there was an armed uprising by five thousand chartists in 1838. During
the early 20th Century, suffragettes took direct action for "votes for women",
the most dramatic example of this being in 1913, when Emily Davison
completely spoiled the royal family's fun by throwing herself in front
of the king's horse at a fashionable horseracing event. Her battered
and now lifeless body prevented the king's horse finishing the race.

Such "rights" as we have were not "given" to us by the state, but won
through direct action. Personally, I have sometimes voted and sometimes
not. It is important that there should be a right to vote,  but it is equally
important that there should be a right  NOT  to vote. If I lived in a country
where voting was  _compulsory_  , I think that would make me  _less_
likely to vote. Surely a principled refusal to accept being forced into
legitimising the state would be the best response in that circumstance?

Dave C