The Reason Why Voting Is Restricted

by Frédéric Bastiat

　　A closer examination of the subject shows us the motive whichcauses the right of suffrage to be based upon the supposition ofincapacity. The motive is that the elector or voter does not exercisethis right for himself alone, but for everybody.

　　The most extended elective system and the most restricted electivesystem are alike in this respect. They differ only in respect to whatconstitutes incapacity. It is not a difference of principle, butmerely a difference of degree.

　　If, as the republicans of our present-day Greek and Roman schoolsof thought pretend, the right of suffrage arrives with one's birth, itwould be an injustice for adults to prevent women and children fromvoting. Why are they prevented? Because they are presumed to beincapable. And why is incapacity a motive for exclusion? Because itis not the voter alone who suffers the consequences of his vote;because each vote touches and affects everyone in the entirecommunity; because the people in the community have a right to demandsome safeguards concerning the acts upon which their welfare andexistence depend.