Should government weed out ignorant voters?
Humanities
Should the government weed out ignorant voters?
Political ignorance in America is a serious problem, and may already have had an impact on last year’s presidential election. As one Newsweek survey (Links to an external site.) points out, large numbers of native-born Americans cannot answer the basic questions on the very simple civics test we require immigrants to pass if they want to become citizens. In addition, we already exclude children, and many of the mentally ill from voting, due to their ignorance and poor judgment. Why not, it’s said, impose similar requirements on native-born adult citizens? Why not require everyone who wants to vote to pass a test focusing on the basic features of American government? A 2016 opinion column (Links to an external site.) in the Washington Post advocated this.
A good idea? Why, or why not?
