If you’ve spent time reading this blog, you know that I’m interested in voting rights. California recently passed a measure allowing 17-year-olds to vote in primary elections provided they turn 18 before the general election. This is only the latest in a series of legislative initiatives to encourage more young people to vote. To learn more about these and other efforts, I reached out to attorney and activist Laura Brill. Aside from clerking for Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and leading a successful career in law, Laura Brill is the founder of The Civics Center, an organization seeking to improve civic engagement among youth. Below is my interview with her. (If you want to see my previous posts on voting rights, you can read my essay here and my interview with expert John Bonifaz here.)
What sparked your interest in improving youth voter engagement?
In early 2017, I learned that California allows young people to preregister to vote when they are 16. I was shocked because my kids were teenagers, and one of them was 16, and at the time, I had no idea that this law existed.
I started asking other lawyers I knew, including people with teenage children, and virtually no one else had heard of this law, either.
Then I learned of another law in California that requires every high school to designate a person responsible for distributing voter registration forms. I asked the office of the California Secretary of State to send me a list of the people responsible in each school. Again, I was shocked because at the time, fewer than 20% of California public high schools had complied with this law.
I started asking more questions. I learned that very few high school students had taken advantage of the preregistration law. In Orange County, some cities had just a handful of students who had preregistered, and statewide, the preregistration rate was around 10%. I learned that many other states allow young people to register or preregister to vote well before they turned 18. Again, however, it seemed that there was very little awareness of these laws and even less organizing and coordination to make sure every eligible student is registered or preregistered to vote by the time they graduate from high school.
It seemed to me that this was an area in which I could make a real difference by shining a light on this opportunity and encouraging people to get involved.
If you are interested in learning more about why this issue is so important, you can check out the blog on The Civics Center’s website. https://thecivicscenter.org/blog. You can also sign up to attend one of our programs on how to run a high school voter registration drive at the website for High School Voter Registration Week: https://www.hsvoterregweek.org.
How did you go about starting the Civics Center?
I did a lot of research before starting The Civics Center. I wanted to know what other organizations were doing about high school voter registration already. I didn’t want to duplicate their efforts. Once I was convinced that starting a new organization was the best way to proceed, I approached a group called Community Partners, which operates as a fiscal sponsor for nonprofit groups. I put together an advisory board and submitted an application to become a formal project under their umbrella. The project was accepted and began formal operations in September of 2018.
How many states currently allow 16 and 17-year-olds to pre-register? Is that number expected to grow?
Currently, 13 states and DC allow young people to preregister starting at 16. These states are California, Colorado, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Utah and Washington.
New York has recently passed a preregistration law, and beginning in January 2020 young people will be able to preregister there beginning at age 16, as well.
Five additional states allow preregistration beginning at age 17. These states are Iowa, Maine, Nevada, New Jersey and West Virginia.
Young people can also register at age 17 if they will turn 18 by a certain election date in many other states. In some instances, this means they can register if they will be 18 by November 2020. In some cases, they have to be 18 by November of this year.
A few states have other cutoff dates, but the bottom line is that the majority of high school seniors can register or preregister to vote right now, and by graduation day of each year, virtually every high school student will be old enough to register or preregister.
It would be great if more state legislatures would adopt laws allowing preregistration at age 16. Even more important, though, I’d love to see every state and every high school do more to encourage young people to take advantage of the laws that already exist.
Should young people attending high school or college in another state register to vote in the state where their parents live or where they attend school?
In general, you are only allowed to register to vote in the state where you are a “resident.” Residence depends on both where you are physically living and where you intend to be long term. So, in general, if you go away to school, but always intend to return to your home state, you should register to vote in your home state. If you intend to remain after graduation in the state where you have gone away to school, then generally that will be your place of residence, and you should register to vote there. Your state of residence can have a variety of different legal impacts beyond voting, so it’s best not to make a decision just based on where you might want to vote.
If you could travel back in time, what advice would you give your 15 year old self? Is that the same advice you would give me now?
Based on your interviews and essays, you are much more knowledgeable and sophisticated than I was at your age. I should probably be asking you for advice, rather than the other way around!
But I can share with you an observation I’ve had that may prove helpful to you. Most efforts succeed not so much because of the brilliance of an idea, but because of the care and persistence that it takes to bring an idea to life. You can decide where you put your energy and attention and how you will cultivate the relationships and ideas that matter to you.
Thank you, Laura!
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