Should there be a political/social issues awareness test for voter-registration?

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I've pondered a bit over voting and how it works. Though I agree that popular-vote is a great way to make decisions, there are also a few drawbacks.
The problem I've been thinking about is the fact that, with our voting system, you get the opinions of ALL of the voters regardless of their social and political awareness. You get the votes of people both in-the-know as well as ignorant. I know of a few people who vote simply by what sounds good to them without even bothering to think about the repurcussions of a certain law being put into action or without knowing anything about the law/act aside from what one pamphlet says. Or, people who simply vote for various candidates simply because of an affiliation with a certain party, whether or not they would like a different candidate more or know anything about any of the candidates.
So, should we possibly enforce a mandatory test as a part of voter-registration in order to solve these problems of carelessness and/or ignorance? What's your opinion and/or ideas?

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@Bean cv,

I think there are too many people for actual testing to be plausible, anyway it would be impossible to determine the grading criteria, remember that many congress members are there because people don't vote "smart", it would be a good step for true democracy if everyone made an informed vote.

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@Bean cv,

Quote:

So, should we possibly enforce a mandatory test as a part of voter-registration in order to solve these problems of carelessness and/or ignorance? What's your opinion and/or ideas?

If such a thing was imposed i think you would have less participation in the voting process.

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@Bean cv,

People can't even be bothered to vote which takes about 5 minutes. Much less take a test to be able to vote.

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@Bean cv,

Those people who wouldn't bother to take the test are also probably the people who wouldn't be able to pass it anyways, though.

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@Bean cv,

I think you'd be surprised how many would pass.

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@Bean cv,

I think you'd be surprised how many would fail... ever watch Jay Leno's "Jaywalking"
segments?

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it
expects what never was and never will be."
- Thomas Jefferson

". . . whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their
own government; that, whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their
notice, they may be relied on to set them right." - Thomas Jefferson

Jefferson saw education as incredibly important and a prerequisite to vote

I think people without any awareness don't bother to participate, so in a way
it takes care of itself. As far as people who see things "selectively" regarding
issues, you'll never change that bit of human nature.

I wouldn't support a test, because who would decide the criteria? Would only
Ivy league graduates make the cut? See the danger in that?

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@Bean cv,

So many would fail any test given that the likes of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton would holler discrimination .
Ivy league grads would split the vote anyway - witness Bush and Kerry .

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@Curmudgeon,

Curmudgeon;9111 wrote:

So many would fail any test given that the likes of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton would holler discrimination .
Ivy league grads would split the vote anyway - witness Bush and Kerry .

I hope you weren't implying only african-americans would fail it in significant
numbers, because there's way more caucasians, and by the law of averages
that means there are way more caucasians who would fail.

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@Bean cv,

Where did he imply "only?" "So many" does not imply discrimination.

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@Bean cv,

I did not mean to imply that African-Americans would be the majority of failures . I meant that MANY would fail , and Jackson and his ilk , which includes many other racial types , would jump on testing as racist OR discriminatory . Please don't try to put meanings to my comments that aren't expressly voiced .

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@Curmudgeon,

Curmudgeon;9139 wrote:

I did not mean to imply that African-Americans would be the majority of failures . I meant that MANY would fail , and Jackson and his ilk , which includes many other racial types , would jump on testing as racist OR discriminatory . Please don't try to put meanings to my comments that aren't expressly voiced .

sorry, that's why I said "I hope you weren't..." Just checking if I was getting
the wrong idea.

It ultimately would be a discriminatory prctice to someone... whenever one
group is allowed to set criteria for civic participation a group that is their
opposite will naturally lose out.

In this case it would naturally be educationally biased. Or views on the issues.
There's no way to test whether someone should be able to vote...

We can only hope that people would see the importance of being educated
on the system and investigating the issues.

here's an interesting, somewhat related podcast from WNYC that features
an interview with a Republican strategist who specializes in getting candidates
to use the right language and words to frame issues. It says a lot about
how things work these days.

http://www.wnyc.org/shows/lopate/episodes/2007/01/08

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Should there be a political/social issues awareness test for voter-registration?

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