In a democratic society felons ought to retain the right to vote

CV: Justice: For this I give the Platonic definition of-- giving each person his or her due VC: Social Contract The Social contact is a mutual agreement between the Government and the governed instituted to protect the rights of individuals in society. In exchange for the protection of Natural right the governed must accept restrictions of certain rights and must assume certain duties. When a society follows and preserves the social contract justice is created. When a society moves away from or abandons its social contract man shall right man, protecting the rights of none and creating no justice. This is relevant to the resolution because the idea of democracy is based on the social contract 1st –Social Contract A. Locke believed that the violation of the social contract negated the contract between the parties and entered them in a sort of state of war in which no rights were preserved. One of the things required of the governed in to uphold the laws and regulations put in place by society, So in this resolution the felons violated the social contract by not upholding the laws of Society so they are essentially allowing for the violation of their own rights and removal from society because, humans, being rational beings, made a conscious choice to not uphold the duties given to them by the government acknowledge that the government is not obligated to protect those rights. As said by philosopher Emmanuel Kant" if a man makes himself a worm he must not complain when he is trodden on" So By violating the Contact felons have essentially removed themselves from society and therefore must be considered as non-citizens to that society. Non-Citizens do not have the right to vote in a foreign country and that is how Felons ought to be treated. They are equal to non-citizens in that regard because just as the felons removed themselves from society non-citizens have not entered into the social contract. B. By allowing Felons to we would not only be giving them all of the rights of law-abiding citizens but would be elevating them above them by saying, even though you violated the contract you are equal to everybody else. By doing this you are creating a double standard by which those who violate the social contract are on level with those who have not which is plainly unjust. 2nd – Impact on society Under the social contract a government is only as strong as its people so in a government were many of the people have shown a lack of Judgment is not a strong government, so by eliminating those from voting you are creating a stronger government. Felons, because they have broken the social contract show bad judgment in society In cases of small local election felons could have a massive negative impact on elections. The effect of this is apparent in small communities where felons may represent a majority. In these communities you get a sort of Trojan horse effect, the Greeks entered troy and destroyed it from the inside out and so would felons destroy these communities. Also Felons who have committed Voter Fraud or Insurrection show a blatant disregard for society so should not participate in governmental decision-making. If we allow even those who have actively worked to destroy society to decide how that society is run we will destroy that society. I will move to my opponents Case. CV: My Opponents Stated core value of democracy is inferior to my core value of justice for one main reason. Now as can be seen the resolution specifies a democracy, However the goal of EVERY democratic society is Justice and the reason a society is democratic is because it believes it is the most just for of government. VC: the Social contract is more valid in today's debate because the only for for a society to thrive or even exist in under a social contract. Individual rights would not exist without a Social contract. So in other words my opponents criterion is irrelevant without first adopting a social contract. Contention 1 A) You must keep in mind that these felons have knowingly violated the social contract and have in essence removed themselves from society. They have then shown a blatant disregard for the state and should not participate in deciding the laws for the law-abiding. This bring me back to my Contention 1 Subpoint A, If you allow the law makers to become the law breakers then you are creating an unequal stage and are devaluing the vote of the law-abiding citizens. B) the idea of rehabilitation is seen to be inherently flawed as it is. I would like to point out that 47% of single time offenders commit another offense within three years and the recidivism numbers continue to grow as per number of arrests to 82%. Second of all the right to vote, if it is deemed to be so important by my opponent does not mean much to felons. Only 5% of felons are actually registered to vote. Also since Felons are consciously committing a crime and a possible punishment for that crime is disenfranchisement it will then act as a deterrent to crime because they will know they will lose the right to vote. Contention 2 A) As I have said earlier not only are we creating inequality by allowing them to vote we are devaluing the voice of the law abiding citizen. Allow me to explain, if we allow felons to move against society then create the laws for that society we are creating a double standard and essentially elevating felons above the law abiding populace. Second, if we allow felons to vote we are giving them equal voice to non-felons and are then putting those who have followed the laws on the same levels as felons. This is plainly not equal and not just. B) My opponent brings to the table the taxation without representation idea in this point. However in the case of felons this can be seen as incorrect. They still can send their children to public schools, the police or firefighters must still come to their help. if we did not tax felons we would be essentially either making them above everybody else by allowing them to have certain services for free that everybody else must pay for. Thank you once again