Old enough to send someone to war, but not to go yourself?
This raises an interesting question: in what way are children not rationally self-interested? How can we justify depriving any of them of their natural rights?
This raises an interesting question: in what way are children not rationally self-interested? How can we justify depriving any of them of their natural rights?
on August 26th, 2007 at 10:03 am
First, the headline is inaccurate, because that’s already the case with millions of Americans. While individuals may be 1-O, or 3-A, or 4-D, or too old under the law, they still can “send someone to war, but not go yourself.”
Second, this presupposed a “natural right” to vote, which no one until the 20th century would seriously defend.
Third, under classical understand (and, I would add, natural rights), children are under the authority of their parents/guardians until they are “of age.” Legally, according to the medieval view (okay, I’m kind of making this up), that meant 21. Contemporary notions of maturity have reduced that age to 18 (when, ironically, today’s 18-year-olds are far less knowledgeable and well-informed than yesterday’s 21-year-olds).
Therefore, under a communal view of suffrage (which I staunchly defend), two reasons strike against children’s suffrage: children are not suited for participation in suffrage; and parents naturally will vote in the best interest of their children anyway, which means that they need not assert their own political preference at the polls.
on August 26th, 2007 at 10:52 am
1) Point taken. I was just trying to invert the old Vietnam-era slogan. But I think I’m still strictly correct because I was only talking about age.
3) Are you serious? I’d say the average 18-year-old today knows far more than the average medieval 21-year-old. Maybe not about raising pigs or growing wheat, but about the workings of government, about basic civics, about international politics, about medicine, and about economics. He might’ve actually READ the Founders or the Bible and the occasional bit of news from outside his own neighborhood.
But I didn’t expect D to assert that children are rationally self-interested.