[ama729]

You forget that mandatory voting also mean that minorities and other "difficult" groups also don't have to make excuses as to why they are voting and also that everything is done to make them votes (since it's mandatory). An employer can't refuse a employee to go voting for example.

[jacquesm]

Minorities or 'difficult groups' (whatever they are) have a right to vote, so they can exercise it if they want to. No excuse needed! This is about being compelled to participate, not about wanting to go and needing an excuse. You never need an excuse, there is an election in progress and you exercise your rights.

Do you have examples of places where employers can interfere so easily with the right to vote?

Are polling stations in those places only open during business hours?

Are the rights of citizens in those places subject to the whims of employers?

That would make for an interesting situation.

I'm not aware of any place where a company could stop its employees from voting if it wanted to do so, but that's an interesting perspective. I don't really understand what voting being mandatory or optional has to do with that though.

[fnordfnordfnord]

>Do you have examples of places where employers can interfere so easily with the right to vote?

In the US.

It has not been too many years since minorities were harassed if/when seen going to the polls. On the other end of that stick there is the fact that minorities were paid/coerced into voting a certain way.

It is definitely not the case that an employer can prevent employees from voting specifically, but they can arrange the workday in such a way as to make it inconvenient for certain employees. Example: Salaried staff can be given time off to vote while hourly staff are told to work overtime; not to mention the fact that salaried workers tend to already have accumulated paid time-off, where hourly workers have none, or less.

[jacquesm]

Then sue the bastards.

[DrJosiah]

You need to pay a lawyer to sue, and you need to pay a lot for a lawyer that will win. The US legal system is "pay for play", despite claims and general belief to the contrary.

[tankenmate]

@jacquesm: I suspect what the parent was saying is in the face of Jim Crow laws or even implicit or subliminal discouragement of minority voting (whatever the cause or reason).

[jacquesm]

Jim Crow laws were LAWS!!

So if there are such laws then they would contradict each other, in that case you have a completely different problem, putting your constituents in the position of having to comply with one law (for instance compulsory voting) or the other (for instance a law to take away the right to vote) but never able to be compliant with both laws at the same time.

Implicit or subliminal discouragement of minority voting would not stop with a compulsory voting law, it would just make those influenced now subject to breaking the law and subject to fines beyond merely (I use that word lightly) being dis-enfranchised.

Such discouragement should be dealt with through the criminal justice system, rather than by forcing everybody to vote.

As you probably realize (or maybe not) I am categorically against nation states forcing their subjects to perform certain acts, be it military service, compulsory voting and many others beside because I think in the aggregate nothing good can come of it.

In the case of compulsory voting, fortunately most countries have seen the light for this lowest-of-all-barriers protest against the way a particular slice of society is run, and 'voter turnout' is a good bell-weather for how well a country is actually representing the interests of its constituents.