Why America Stopped Voting

Download or read book Why America Stopped Voting written by Mark L. Kornbluh and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2000 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sometime during the first two decades of the 20th century, the participation of the American electorate began its plummet; voter turnouts fell in each election after record heights in 1890. Kornbluh (history, Michigan State U.) examines mass political behavior in 20 successive national elections, arguing that the rapid decline of electoral participation was gradual and a result of fundamental social change, a conclusion maintained by the author to be at odds with previous literature focusing on discrete political events to explain voter demobilization. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR