Our Founding Fathers dreamed of a political system that assured every man a voice in his government. However, poor people, women, African-Americans and young adults were left out of that version of the “dream.”

Two-hundred and twenty-six years later, after the ratification of the 14th, 15th, 19th, and 26th Amendments, every person male or female, black or white, rich or poor, age 18 and over, has been afforded the opportunity to register and vote. Yet many people do not take advantage of this opportunity. Young adults 18 to 24 years of age consistently lag behind every other segment of the population in voting.

Lisa Ling, 28, co-host of ABC’s “The View,” has her own theory on why 18 to 24 year olds do not vote. She says young people “are incredibly socially conscious and deeply passionate about a great many issues–just not the ones candidates are touting.”

Third Millennium’s Neglection 2000 project analyzed the television ad buys for the 2000 primary season. According to Neglection 2000, Americans ages 18 to 34 made up roughly one-third of the voting age population, but accounted for 17 percent of the viewing audience of the shows on which candidates placed their ads. The study revealed that “no candidate targeted young adults in an amount proportional to their share of the voting-age population.”

That certainly helps explain why, according to the US Census Bureau, voter turnout for the 2000 election among 18 to 24 year olds was the lowest in history for a presidential election year. But I’m not so sure you can relate the lack of voter turnout to a lack of interest in politics.

According to the Oregon Secretary of State’s office, there are at least twenty 18, 19, and 20 year olds currently serving in state legislatures. I had the opportunity interview nearly all of these legislators and through my own research I identified over thirty other young politicians, 18 to 24 years old, serving in various capacities throughout the country from library board member to city council member to mayor.

Ignorance aside there are drawbacks to running for office at such a young age, not the least of which is money and media coverage.
Of course, the amount of money needed to mount a statewide campaign is going to vary dramatically with the costs of running for a seat on the local mosquito control board. However, in most cases, these young candidates raised less than $5,000. In some cases they raised much less.

At the age of 20, Aaron Tedjeske, a sophomore at Saint Francis University, ran for and won a seat on the Windber, Pa. Borough Council after raising only $175.

This is not to say that being elected at a young age is easy, but it can be done. Often times young people are dissuaded from running for office simply because of their age, but from the responses I received the age issue is more often a positive than a negative.

Young politicians reported receiving “invaluable” and “fair” media coverage due in large part to their age. And sometimes this free media exposure helped to level the playing field against a well-funded incumbent.

Derek Seaver, an 18-year-old vying for Ohio State Representative appeared as a guest on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.” While two young Pennsylvania mayors, 18-year-old Jeffrey Dunkel and 19-year-old Christopher Portman, have appeared on NBC’s “Today” show, “The Rosie O’Donnell Show,” as well as “Good Morning America.”

If you do decide to run, you’re not alone. It’s happening on college campuses all across the country. Southwestern Indiana alone has three college students running for office: Eric Davis, a 21-year-old student at the University of Southern Indiana, running for state representative; Kurt Jourdan, a 19-year-old student also at USI, campaigning for Vanderburgh County Council; and Charles Gibson, a 19-year-old student at Vincennes University, running for sheriff in Know County.

This past September, over a half dozen candidates under the age of 25 ran in the New York primary. One of those candidates was Joel Rivera, a 22-year-old junior at Fordham University. He not only won, he is currently the youngest majority leader of any legislative body in the country.

Candidates are going to continue ignoring important youth issues until young people start voting. For now, though, the only way youth issues are going to get addressed is if young people actually start running for office and address the issues themselves.

-The writer, a student at Rice University, is President of
YouthElect (www.YouthElect.org).