7.4: Politics in the United States

Learning Objectives

By the end of this section, you should be able to:

• Explain the significance of voting in determining U.S. policy
• Discuss factors the influence voter participation rates in U.S. election
• Explore the influence of race, class, and gender issues on the voting process

Figure 17.9: Americans' voting rights are a fundamental element of the U.S. democratic structure. In elections people care about, the turnout can be very high, and people go to great lengths to ensure their vote is counted. (Credit: GPA Photo Archive/flickr)

When describing a nation’s politics, we should define the term. Different people may associate the term with freedom, compromise, power, corruption, or rhetoric. Political science looks at politics as the interaction between citizens and the institutions of government. Sociology studies politics as a means to understand the underlying social norms and values of a group. A society’s political structures and practices provide insight into the distribution of power and wealth, as well as larger philosophical values and cultural beliefs. A cursory sociological analysis of U.S. politics might suggest that Americans' desire to promote equality and democracy on a theoretical level is at odds with the nation’s real-life capitalist orientation.

Lincoln's famous phrase “of the people, by the people, for the people” is at the heart of the U.S. system, and sums up its most essential aspect: that citizens willingly and freely elect representatives they believe will look out for their best interests. Although many Americans take free elections for granted, it is a vital foundation of any democratic polity. When the U.S. government was formed, however, large groups like women and African Americans were denied the right to vote. Each of these groups struggled to secure suffrage rights, yet this historical struggle doesn't always inspire many Americans to show up at the polls and cast their ballots. Problems with the democratic process, including limited voter turnout, require us to more closely examine complex social issues that influence political participation.

Voter Participation

Voter participation is essential to the success of a democratic republic like the U.S.  Although many Americans are quick to complain about laws and political leadership, in any given election year roughly half the population does not vote (United States Elections Project, 2010). Some years have seen even lower turnouts; in 2010, for instance, only 37.8 percent of the population participated in the electoral process (United States Elections Project, 2011). Poor turnout can skew election results, particularly if one age groups socioeconomic class is more diligent in its efforts to make it to the polls, despite the efforts of many community organizers, voting advocacy groups, and partisan "get out the vote" campaigns. 

Race, Gender, and Class Issues

Although recent records have shown more minorities voting now than ever before, this trend is still fairly new. Historically, African Americans and other minorities have been underrepresented at the polls. Black men were not allowed to vote at all until after the Civil War.  Black women gained the right to vote along with other women only with the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. For years, African Americans who were brave enough to vote were discouraged by discriminatory "Jim Crow" laws passed in many southern states, which required poll taxes and literacy tests of prospective voters. Literacy tests were outlawed in 1965, when President Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act.

The 1960s saw other important reforms in U.S. voting. Shortly before the Voting Rights Act was passed, the 1964 U.S. Supreme Court case Reynolds v. Sims changed the nature of elections. This landmark decision reaffirmed the notion of “one person, one vote,” a concept holding that all people’s votes should be counted equally. Before this decision, unequal distributions of populations enabled small groups of people in sparsely populated rural areas to have as much voting power as the denser populations of urban areas. After Reynolds v. Sims, districts were redrawn so that they would include equal numbers of voters.

In 2013 the Supreme Court repealed several important aspects of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, ruling that southern states no longer need the stricter scrutiny that was once required to prohibit racial discrimination in voting practices in the South. Following this decision, several states moved forward with voter identification laws that had previously been banned by federal courts. Officials in Texas, Mississippi, and Alabama claim that new identification (ID) laws were needed to reduce voter fraud. Opponents point to the Department of Justice statistics from the relevant time period, indicating that only twenty-six voters, of 197 million voters in federal elections, were found guilty of voter fraud between 2002 and 2005. "Contemporary voter identification laws are trying to solve a problem that hasn’t existed in over a century” (Campbell, 2012). Further legislative efforts to pass bills that would impose new restrictions on voting continue.  Opponents note that new voter ID laws disproportionately affect minorities and the poor, posing an additional obstacle to many hoping to exercise their Constitutional right to vote.

Like race and ethnicity, social class also has influenced voting practices. Voting rates among lower-educated, lower-paid workers are lower than for people with higher socioeconomic status, which fosters a system in which people with more power and access to resources have the means to reinforce their power and safeguard their resources. Several explanations have been offered to account for this difference (Raymond 2010). Workers in low-paying service jobs might find it harder to get to the polls because they lack flexibility in their work hours, and quality daycare to look after children while they vote. Because a larger share of racial and ethnic minorities are employed in such positions, social class may be linked to race and ethnicity in its influence on voting rates. New requirements for specific types of voter identification in some states are likely to compound these issues, because it may take additional time away from work, impose a substantial cost to obtain necessary documents, as well as to cover additional child care or transportation needs, in order for voters to get the needed IDs. The impact on the poor may cause a further decrease in voter participation, reducing the incentives for elected officials to represent their interests. Attitudes play a role as well. Some people of low socioeconomic status doubt their vote will count, or that their voice will be heard compared with the voices of the wealthy who can donate large sums to political campaigns in exchange for the chance to personally interact with candidates at fundraisers.

As suggested earlier, money can carry a lot of influence in U.S. democracy. But there are other means to make one’s voice heard. Free speech can be influential, and people can participate in the democratic system through volunteering with political parties, writing to elected officials, sharing views in a public forum such as a social media post or a letter to the editor of a news agency, joining (or forming!) an issue advocacy organizations or political action committee, participating in public demonstrations, and even running for a local office.

The Judicial System

The third branch of the U.S. government is the judicial system, which consists of local, state, and federal courts. The U.S. Supreme Court is the highest court in the United States, and it has the final say on decisions about the constitutionality of laws that citizens challenge. As noted earlier, some rulings have a direct impact on the political system, such as recent decisions about voter identification and campaign financing. Other Supreme Court decisions affect different aspects of society, and they are useful for sociological study because they help us understand cultural changes. For example, the 2015 decision in Obergefell v. Hodges legalized same-sex marriage nationwide, fundamentally altering the social landscape of the American family. More recently, the 2022 ruling in Dobbs v Jackson Women's Health Organization overturned decades of precedent by ending federal constitutional protections for abortion, returning such authority to the states. Additionally, decisions regarding affirmative action and student debt relief continue to provide rich material for cultural analysis, as they reflect and influence evolving norms and values regarding equity, meritocracy, and the role of the state in people's individual lives.