Just saw on Fox that legislators in California
have introduced a bill to fine those who don’t vote.
My response is naturally: If we’re going to fine people for choosing not to exercise a Right, does that mean we can start fining Anti-Gunners for choosing not to own a firearm?
In my mind it makes a lot of sense!
I just woke up so my mind is a little foggy but are they not going to have a hard time collecting fines from the dead?
But requiring voter ID is wrong🙄
To me, that borders on buying votes. 
Exactly! And who will get fined? Inner-city folks, impoverished folks, working class folks, immigrant folks.
I, actually dread California, as it seems to be the testing ground for whatever next level governmental overreach that is coming to the US. 
That could be an AWESOME unintended consequence for this… maybe then a list of dead voting debtors will be able to be FOI’d… 
Unless they’re going to just make their relatives pay.
Yeah, I want to see them enforce this without proper voter registration and voter ID… 
Voting is a right, but should not be forced. Like the 1A, you have freedom of speech, or freedom to not speak. There are times I don’t vote, mainly for local elections that I can’t decide who I think is better, or even items on the ballot that I don’t have an opinion on either way.
The dead vote, they generally vote Democrat.
Freedom is the right to make the wrong choice. Any “right” that is compulsory is no “right” at all. Compulsion changes it from duty to drudgery.
No other right is treated this way. We have freedom of speech, but may choose to remain silent. We are free to worship at the alter of our choice, but may also choose to not worship at all.
Freedom. You can take it or leave it, because that’s what freedom means.
Which is the point.
From the San Francisco Chronicle, “Emilee Chapman, an assistant professor of political science at Stanford University who supports the idea of mandatory voting, said that while the Constitution protects the right to vote, no case has ever clearly established that it also guarantees a right not to vote.”
…Interesting… I wonder since the Constitution protects the right to bear arms, if any case has ever clearly established that it also guarantees a right not to bear arms?
There is also the group that will NOT vote because it is made mandatory, along with all the people that will read the last ad they like before voting and is all they will remember so if he/she is good the rest of the party is too.
To me this is worse then not voting at all. People should get involved and understand who they are voting for and why (and I dont mean because they like what they are wearing).
If you don’t want to be fined, vote Republican.
Welcome to the group @mike31!
… or vote democrat… or vote whoever paid your bus fair to the polling stations… or just pick a random box. I’m guessing since this is coming out of CA, the author is hoping they’ll vote “D”.
The problem as I see it is that if you take people who are NOT inclined to vote and make them do so anyway, you just tick them off, and there is NO way to make sure they even TRY to educate themselves in any aspect of what they’re voting for.
It’s the problem with Utopian thinking… that if you make them vote, they’ll do the right thing and read up on what and who they’re voting for and actually engage themselves in the civic process. But you can’t fine people into doing the right thing. It doesn’t work like that with actual people. 
This should make it easier to prove voter fraud. Assume I’m a registered voter after this passes, and I don’t vote. If i don’t get fined, doesn’t that indicate someone else must have voted in my name? Get a group of people in the same situation and use their testimony to help prove the case!
I think it falls under freedom of speech!
You have the right to speak as much as you have the right in choosing NOT to speak.…
What about under-votes (missing or intentionally not voting on a candidate/amendment) or over-votes (where two candidates are voted for)? And, on both, how would they fine someone as there was no way to know intent or just not knowing what they were doing?
A lot of over-votes in Florida (along with hanging chads) became the deciding issue in a Presidential election here.
I like the way your mind works. Have you thought about running for office in California?