Editorial: Voting is crucial to democracy and your way to influence policy

On the one hand, it’s hard to understand why so many people don’t vote.

Voting is an opportunity to influence the government decisions that affect your life.

Think about your day. From the moment you get up and turn on the water to brush your teeth and put on clothes you purchased and get in the car to drive to work, every single thing you do is impacted by government. The quality of that water, the tax you paid on your suit, the quality of the roads on your commute (and whether you’re slowed down by no-turn-on-red signs).

Voting is one of the primary ways residents of a town, county, state and the country can impact those decisions.

The effect is indirect, of course, and voting is a collective endeavor. Even if you vote for people who support your point of view, there is no guarantee enough others will agree to put those people into office. You can vote in every election and still not be governed by the people you support, but failing to vote means you’ve given up one of the primary tools you have as a U.S. citizen and a resident of Indiana to affect change.

On the other hand, it’s also not hard to understand why people get turned off from voting. Just look at Indiana’s 5th Congressional District, where some of the candidates running in the Republican primary are attacking one another with such ferocity that it’s uncomfortable to watch.

The battle between the top two contenders—incumbent Rep. Victoria Spartz and state Rep. Chuck Goodrich—is just vicious. There are accusations related to bullying, harassment, alcohol and just general “bad behavior,” the latter phrase hurled by each side against the other.

Democrats must be relishing this contest. By the time the primary is over, the Republican left standing will be bruised and battered. In a district that has consistently produced the GOP lawmakers, the Republican nominee will still be favored to win. But will the people who live in the district feel especially good about the person representing them?

Accusations are flying in the governor’s race, too, although they are not nearly so brutal. Still, ads paid for by campaign committees and outside groups have accused candidates of lying, taking radical stands and being a RINO (a Republican in name only), one of the harshest criticisms one Republican can lob against another these days.

These kinds of attacks are exhausting and do nothing to elevate the crucial debates candidates and voters need to be having about key issues related to jobs, the economy, education, immigration and more.

We’re not suggesting that campaigns can’t be aggressive and comparative. It’s helpful when candidates point out the ways they would vote or act differently than their opponents. But it’s not helpful when those efforts are convoluted or misleading. That turns off voters, which we believe is at least one reason voter turnout isn’t higher.

In these last weeks before the primary, we urge the candidates to tone down the rancor and turn up the talk about issues—not just for the sake of voters but for what it will mean generally for democracy.•

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