Pulling the Curtain: Voting in America
Portions of this show first aired as part of the BackStory episode “Early and Often: Voting in America,” broadcast in October 2008 and which you can listen to here.
Elections are at the very foundation of our democracy, but voter turnout in the last presidential election was only about 57 percent. It’s easy to be nostalgic for the Gilded Age era of 80 percent voter turnout… until you consider all the people who weren’t eligible to vote back then. Then again, for more than a century, one class of people who don’t vote today were allowed to vote: non-US citizens.
On this special Election Day episode of BackStory, the History Guys put current voting trends in historical perspective. They also consider the changing mechanisms of voting, and look at the how for much of American history, the electoral college system maintained racial hierarchies in the South. And, as always, they field calls from listeners interested in exploring the history of voting in America.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Guests Include:
- Alexander Keyssar, Professor of History and Social Policy at Harvard University
- Mark Summers, Professor of History at the University of Kentucky
- Jamie Raskin, Professor of Law at American University
Further Exploration
Resources galore! Peruse a list of outside sources compiled by the BackStory team to provide a more complete picture of the history of voting in America, and consult a bibliography of works used in the making of this show.
Listen to individual show segments.
Even Further
See a listing of music used in this episode.
Read the listener discussion that helped shape this show.
6 Responses
Trackbacks & Pingbacks
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Pulling the Curtain: Music | BackStory with the American History Guys :
[...] The following is a list of the music used in the BackStory episode “Pulling the Curtain: Voting in America,” broadcast in November 2012. You can listen to the entire episode here. [...]
Quote -- November 2, 2012 @ 3:25 pm -
Pulling the Curtain: Further Reading | BackStory with the American History Guys :
[...] The following is a list of resources used or consulted in the making of the BackStory episode “Pulling the Curtain: Voting in America,” broadcast in November 2012. You can listen to the entire episode here. [...]
Quote -- November 2, 2012 @ 3:30 pm -
Pulling the Curtain: Show Segments | BackStory with the American History Guys :
[...] The following are individual show segments included in the BackStory episode “Pulling the Curtain: Voting in America,” broadcast in November 2012. You can listen to the entire episode here. [...]
Quote -- November 5, 2012 @ 3:27 pm
This was a fascinating show which shed some light on why we still have the Electoral College and certain groups of people being so interested in having voter ID laws to stop voter fraud which doesn’t exsist.
QuoteThis program was really entriguing and really I had waited a long time to hear such a detailed, entertaining (and disturbing) review of the evelotion of voting and the electoral college in our country. Loved the segment and am looking forward to now reading some more books about it.
QuoteThis program was really intriguing and really I had waited a long time to hear such a detailed, entertaining (and disturbing) review of the evolution of voting and the electoral college in our country. Loved the segment and am looking forward to now reading some more books about it.
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