• ChaoticNeutralCzech
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    17 days ago

    I live in Europe and only need to prove citizenship with an ID to vote. I thought all the “registration” talk I’ve been hearing was party-based to prevent Democrats from sabotaging Republican primaries by voting for their outsiders and vice versa, not for the actual election.

    • JusticeForPorygon@lemmy.world
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      17 days ago

      Yeah no it’s for any kind of popular vote, local, state, and federal. It’s insane

      What’s funny is that it’s incredibly easy to change parties, so if there was a combined effort to alter the outcome of the party’s nominee, it would probably work. In fact, you could argue that’s what happened in the early 20th century.

      To make a long story short, a lifetime or two ago, Democrats were the right leaning “small federal government” party, and Republicans were the ones pushing for social change, in fact, Abraham Lincoln (who was a crucial figure in abolishing slavery in the US) was the first Republican ever elected president.

      Anyway, from the late 1800s and into 1900s, democrats began electing more progressive candidates (Roosevelt is a big example) who were more on board with things like equality and government assistance programs than the Republicans, who, one could argue, began to fall back into the older ways of religion and “family values” .

      p.s. I wrote this in the middle of a calculus lecture so it might not be the most comprehensive history. If anyone wants to add or correct anything please do so

      p.p.s I also now realize you probably weren’t asking for a breif on the history of politics in the US lol