Amendment XXVI (26)

Amendment XXVI

Ratified July 1, 1971.

Section 1.
     The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

Section 2.
     The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.


     The twenty-sixth amendment is important because it gives US citizens that are eighteen years of age or older the right to vote, rather than keeping the voting age at twenty-one. The student activism movement protesting the Vietnam War became a big factor in driving to lower the voting age, because many young men were ineligible to vote and were conscripted to fight in the war, so they had no influence to the people sending them off to risk their lives. President Dwight D. Eisenhower was the first to state his support for age-based suffrage for those that are eighteen or older. Richard Nixon also helped out with lowering the age by signing an extension of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which required the voting age to be eighteen in all federal, state, and local elections. This was later changed to apply only to federal elections. The time span for the ratification of this amendment is the shortest of any of the amendments to date, which was three months and eight days.

     This is a group of young protestors walking around the streets holding up signs in effort to gain the support to pass the twenty-sixth amendment. Eighteen year olds weren't allowed to vote before the twenty-sixth amendment was passed and with the help of protestors like these, the twenty-sixth amendment finally was passed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8wTqOWuc8s

     This video talks about the right of the states to be able to lower their voting age but they aren't allowed to raise their voting age and whether or not this is right. One of the debaters makes a good point when he talks about some adults not having as much political knowledge and that the youth can hold just as much knowledge if not more than some of those adults.