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WHY VOTE?...

...Because it is your fundamental right as an American, and the most basic means by which you have a voice in how your government works. By voting, you participate in a process that determines who will represent you, your family, and your neighbors in your community, your state, and your country.

West Virginia requires that you register to vote, and aside from registering at your local court house, you may register by mail or when you get or renew your drivers’ license.  In addition to these places, many civic organizations and political parties sponsor voter registration drives at colleges and universities, shopping malls, work sites, fairs, and other community events.

Why don’t more Americans register and vote? The most likely reason–they don’t think their one vote will make a difference. But what if just one person on every street or in every voting precinct thought that way? We might find that the course of history would change.

• that several of our states, including California, Idaho, Oregon, Texas and Washington, became states by just ONE vote?

• That in 1948, Lyndon B. Johnson, our 36th president, became a U.S. senator by a ONE vote margin?

• And that same year, if Thomas E. Dewey had gotten ONE vote more per precinct in Ohio and California, the presidential election would have been thrown to the U.S. House of Representatives, where Dewey enjoyed more support than his rival -- incumbent Harry S. Truman? In fact, Dewey was expected to win the general election by a landslide, so most Republicans stayed home. Only 51.5 percent of the electorate voted in 1948, and Truman defeated Dewey.

Not convinced?

• In the 1960 presidential election, ONE additional vote per precinct in Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey and Texas would have denied John F. Kennedy the presidency and put Richard M. Nixon in office eight years earlier.

• In recent years, the outcomes of many state and congressional races have been reversed as recounts have shifted a handful of votes from one candidate to another.

• Each and every vote is the voice of a citizen of the United States of America. One voice speaking out can change the course of history.