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Show Old Enough To Tax Old Enough To Vote By J. TERRENCE LYONS Oregon Daily Emerald The collegiate election for President Presi-dent of the United States, "Choice '68," to be held on college campuses cam-puses this April has raised the annual an-nual question of the 18-year-old vote. The most clear and perhaps the most precious manifestation of our democratic system is the vote. The franchise marks full participation in the democratic process, complete acceptance of the rights and duties of citizens. The issue at question is: Who should be accorded this right and responsibility. The objectivity and consistency of the age measure, coupled with the Fourteenth Amendment and recent Supreme Court decisions indicates that age is the only ac-cepable ac-cepable criterion for suffrage. But in drawing the line at a particular age, we ought to choose one which reflects citizens' responsibility and ability. Education, probably the most reasonable measure of voter quality, qual-ity, opts for the eighteen cutoff. Less than ten per cent of the nation na-tion graduates from college, but all schoolboys are required to attend school till the age of sixteen, and most graduate from high school (at seventeen or eighteen). Thus the natural conclusion of education is at eighteen rather than twenty-one. Is it not more reasonable to lower the voting age to eighteen ; to make educational levels rather the privilege priv-ilege to drink an effective measure of voting ability? The citizens' responsibility is a second pertinent criterion for suffrage. suf-frage. For every citizen pays for the rights and privileges of his citizenship; citi-zenship; and he does so primarily through taxation and selecteive service. ser-vice. A Voice In Taxation Because of the eighteen-year-old cutoff in education, most citizens assume the burden of taxation at eighteen. The majority of the American Am-erican population reaches into its pocketbook to pay the wages of democracy at eighteen. They should be given the vote they pay for. The dollar is not the only measure mea-sure of the cost of freedom. Years of young men's lives, and those lives themselves, are demanded and given in defense of the private ballot. The eighteen-year -old is required re-quired to register for the draft (and with the new bill in effect he's the first to be called), but he is not allowed to register to vote. The present system demands responsibilities re-sponsibilities of 18-21-year olds, but denies them accompanying rights. If we were more like the "rebel generation" we are billed as, we might call it taxation without representation. |