Analysis of Voting in Connecticut's Capital City

“Voting is your civic duty.” This is a pretty common sentiment, especially each November as Election Day approaches. But what does it mean?

It was not until the 15th Amendment was passed in 1869 that black men were allowed to vote. But even so, many would-be voters faced artificial hurdles like poll taxes, literacy tests, and other measures to discourage them from exercising their voting rights. This would continue until the 24th Amendment in 1964, which eliminated the poll tax, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which ended Jim Crow laws. Women were denied the right to vote until 1920, when the long efforts of the women’s suffrage movement resulted in the 19th Amendment. With these amendments removing the previous barriers to voting (particularly sex and race), theoretically, all American citizens over the age of 21 could vote by the mid-1960s. Later, in 1971, the American voting age was lowered to 18, building on the idea that if a person was old enough to serve their country in the military, they should be allowed to vote.

Sadly, the sentiment of being old enough to serve one's country has not been extended to many other rights, especially those related to the Second Amendment. Regardless of the flaws in logic we see in government policies, I thought today I would analyze the voting record of the City of Hartford, which has a large black population while avoiding commentary on any political views to see what we can uncover.

The City of Hartford, according to census information, contains slightly over 120K residences yet according to early polling numbers, less than 7,000 people made the effort to vote. The rhetoric that cities are havens for certain political ideologies is not reflected in the results, that begs other questions.

• If Hartford residents did not feel it was worthwhile to vote, do they suffer from a lack of leadership and the ability for an individual to inspire others?
• Did voters have familiarity with the candidates and the distinctions between them? Or alternatively, where all of the candidates non-distinct and felt the same?
• The City of Hartford was littered with Lawn Signs mentioning candidate names but that was not enough. In what ways did the media fail the voters in communicating the value proposition of each person on the ballot?
• Was this a scenario where the political parties concentrated marketing efforts on other parts of the state and left it to the candidates to market themselves?
• Did someone forget that the phrase With Liberty and Justice for all, might have been the first utterance of the true goal of diversity and inclusion?
• There was only one candidate that honorably served in our Armed Forces that was on the ballot. They got the lowest vote count.

In all honestly, we might never know the true crux of the issue. Still, I believe it is worthwhile for every American to question the election results as everyone must exercise their civic duty. If Americans are feeling disenfranchised, then we owe it to ourselves to understand why and to find leaders who will step in and fill the gap.

#Diversitymatters #inclusionmatters #maga #cancelculture #immigration #connecticut #diversityandinclusion #uscg #usmc #armedforces