page_title: Twenty-sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution
section_title: Opposition
hierarchical_section_title: Twenty-sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution / Background / Opposition
caption_attribution_description: English: 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution, page 1.
context_page_description: The Twenty-sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution lowered the minimum voting age in the United States from 21 to 18.
  The United States Congress approved the amendment on March 23, 1971, and sent it to the states to be ratified. Within three months and eight days, the states had ratified the amendment, and it became part of the Constitution. This was the quickest amendment to be ratified in United States history.
context_section_description: Not everybody supported lowering the minimum voting age.  Opponents to giving younger people the vote had several arguments.  Many argued that teenagers were not mature or responsible enough to vote.
  Other people argued that teenagers did not know enough to have the right to vote.  One historian writes:
  A former U.S. District Judge testified before Congress that, based on the results of quizzes and polling, teens [had] 'a [terrible] ignorance of even our own country's history, to say nothing of the history of the world.  Anybody really qualified to exercise the right of suffrage ought to have a fair knowledge of the course of history.'"
  Others criticized the "old enough to fight, old enough to vote" argument.  For example, in 1953, the popular magazine Collier's Weekly said this argument "doesn't justify giving young ladies of eighteen the right to franchise [vote]."  They added: "If a man if old enough to vote when he's old enough to fight, then logically the man who is too old to fight out to lose the right to vote."
  Another example comes from an editorial written by the New York Times in 1967.  The paper wrote: "The requirements for a good soldier and for a good voter are not the same.  For the soldier, youthful enthusiasm and physical endurance are [of most] importance; for the voter, maturity of judgment far outweighs other qualifications."
  Finally, some people thought lowering the voting age was not that important for the country, and that it should be left up to each individual state.
caption: Supporters said the 14th Amendment (pictured) required all adults to have the right to vote
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