A Voter's Obligation to the Public Interest

Last week, Edward B. Foley, who directs Election Law @ Moritz, Ohio State's law school, put online the draft of a paper entitled "Voters as Fiduciaries." The paper makes the argument that voters should not be voting their personal interests, but should instead be expressing their best judgment of what is in the public interest, including the interest of future generations.

An important question is whether voting is a personal right or an exercise of self-expression (with elections the aggregation of assertions of self-expression) or a public service, akin to jury duty or voting in a referendum on a public policy issue that does not directly involve one's self-interest.

Another way of looking at this issue is by considering that when we vote for representatives, we are voting for people who have a fiduciary duty to act in the public interest. In order to select someone for this purpose, do we not also have an obligation to act in the public interest, that is, to select someone who we believe has the best ability to fulfill this fiduciary duty?

Foley argues that the voter too has a fiduciary duty, but I don't feel this — the most controversial part of his argument — is necessary to the argument, although it is a valuable concept in the consideration of future generations and in direct democracy. What is necessary is to look at the right to vote as coming with a responsibility to not just pick someone who will help our class or race or industry, etc., or save us money, but rather someone who will best represent the community, to the best of our judgment.

This view of voting does a lot of good things. It emphasizes that voting is not just an abstract right that has been fought for and won, and therefore can be ignored, like the right to petition the government for redress of grievances. Voting is also an obligation that not only comes with citizenship, but is something we owe to our fellow citizens, including to the children who cannot yet vote and to future generations.

For example, when a school budget is up for a referendum vote, do we think what it will do to our property taxes or what it will mean to the future of our community and our country to have a well-educated citizenship? When we vote for a council member, do we think whether a candidate is of the same race or gender or class as us, or whether a candidate will work for a vision of the community that we share?

This emphasis on voting as service "elevates the status of voting and its esteem" and, therefore, makes it more likely that people will feel obligated to vote, and obligated to learn about the candidates and the issues, not only for themselves, but out of concern for the future of their community, so that they can vote more skillfully and, therefore, more responsibly.

It also makes it more likely that civics education will be emphasized in schools, so that future voters will better understand how their various levels of government work and how to understand the issues they are most likely to have to decide on.

Foley's vision of voting is a valuable one. It also provides an excellent complement to government ethics' emphasis on the public interest over personal interests.

Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics

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