A Very Short Fact: In recent US elections, around 36% of total citizens have voted in midterm elections and about 50% in presidential.
“First, Americans elect more than 500,000 public officials, more than is the case in any other democracy. We separately elect executives, legislators, and in some cases judges (that varies from state to state), at the federal, state, and local levels … The so-called long ballot evolved in the nineteenth century as a way to extend democracy, but some claim that our system might have produced too much of a good thing.
Because the presidency is the largest prize in the system, the quadrennial election of the president of the United States dominates all other elections. As a result, citizens concentrate on the presidential election and pay less attention to other elections “down the ballot.” Some citizens vote only for those elections at the top and leave other choices blank. This phenomenon is called falloff and can amount to more than 25 percent on extremely long ballots.”
[Pgs 1 - 6: American Political Parties and Elections: A Very Short Introduction (2nd ed.) by L. Sandy Maisel]
Image credit: “English: 2018 Women's March in Missoula, Montana.” by Montanasuffragettes, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia.
