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Drafting & Voting
During World War 2, President Franklin Roosevelt lowered the drafting age to 18. This resulted in people questioning why 18-year-olds could go to war and die for their country, but couldn't vote. The slogan for this was "Old enough to fight, old enough to vote". -
Jennings Randolph
In 1942, a congressman from West Virginia, named Jennings Randolph, introduced the idea to the federal legislation to lower the voting age. -
Georgia
Georgia is the first state to lower the age in state and local elections. -
Protesting
The United States get involved in the Vietnam War and this results in the topic of the voting age being lowered and it is discussed again. Many youth voting rights activists hold protests to get the government to recognize this issue. -
Voting Rights Act
Congress passed a bill called the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that lowered the voting age to 18. Later that year, President Richard Nixon signed the bill, though he believed that it should be up to the states. -
Supreme Court
The Supreme Court looked over the decision made by Congress. They believed that Congress had overstepped as they didn't believe that Congress had the right to decide the voting age for state and local elections. This case, Oregon v Mitchell, ruled that Congress only had the right to regulate the minimum age for federal elections. This meant that 18-20 years old could vote for president and vice president, but not state officials. -
Dissatisfaction
There was mass dissatisfaction with this decision so there were many people protesting this. This resulted in states gaining support for a Constitutional amendment. Congress suggested an amendment that would permanently lower the voting age so there would be no confusion during the next election. -
Ratification
The US Senate voted unanimously for the amendment. Only 13 days passed before the House voted in favor of the amendment. Once given over to the state legislature, two months is all it took for there to be enough states to ratify the amendment. -
Amendment
This amendment went into effect on July 1, 1971, but was signed by President Nixon on July 5. This was the fastest ratified amendment in US history as it took only 4 months.