The First Day of Amendment 4 for Re-enfranchised Voters

Andrew Donaldson

Born and raised in West Virginia, Andrew has since lived and traveled around the world several times over. Though frequently writing about politics out of a sense of duty and love of country, most of the time he would prefer discussions on history, culture, occasionally nerding on aviation, and his amateur foodie tendencies. He can usually be found misspelling/misusing words on Twitter @four4thefire and his food writing website Yonder and Home. Andrew is the host of Heard Tell podcast.

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3 Responses

  1. Aaron David says:

    I am generally of the opinion that this is a universal good. Now, I am also of the opinion that we should restore ALL of these peoples rights. No horrific sex offender registries, no firearms bans. If they aren’t deemed a risk to society then we shouldn’t be infringing on them in any way.

    (And yes, I think there are a lot of areas where the gov’t tramples on peoples rights, and we need to stop that also. But let’s start with something simple.)Report

    • Maribou in reply to Aaron David says:

      “. If they aren’t deemed a risk to society then…”

      I think the trick of it is that “risk to society” is not a binary. Some people are much more of a risk to society under some circumstances (say, being allowed to own guns or having unfettered access to small children) than others. It makes some sense to say “ok, IFFFF these conditions are imposed, you probably won’t hurt anyone” about some people – like it’s the most logical way to look at some offenders. (This is separate from whether those conditions are imposed effectively or fairly – the latter has more to do with whether they should or shouldn’t be enacted, in my view, but it’s important to understand that risk to society is a continuum when you’re looking at prison reform, people being out in society without being fully cleared, etc.)

      Voting rights is a different thing.Report

  2. JoeSal says:

    Rights as a social construct will be weaponized by political factions. This is the downside of a constitutional republic. ‘Social rights’ will be tortured in meaning to pick winners and losers at various points in time.Report