(Mike is 18, and chose to compete in a higher age bracket)
"Those who don't vote have no right to complain!" This phrase, uttered mostly around election time, is thought to be true. In fact, to the utterers, it seems impossible to refute. However, it once seemed impossible to refute the "fact" that the Earth is flat. Even though just about everyone agreed hundreds of years ago that the Earth is flat, the belief turned out to be a fallacy. Today, just about everyone agrees with the above quote about voting, but it, too, is a fallacy. Nonvoters have every right to complain that politicians are exercising power over them. The voters put the politicians in office, the voters give them the consent and the power to run the lives of the people within the claimed territory of the state, and the voters make it possible for someone to obtain a position of power; yet, the nonvoters are vilified when they complain about the actions of politicians. Why is this so? The nonvoters take no part in elevating any politician into a position of power. Therefore, what right does a politician have in exercising power over the nonvoter? And if the politician has no just power over the nonvoter, why shouldn't the nonvoter complain? If someone is being robbed, and he does not suggest that the robber should rob banks instead of houses, does the person being robbed have a right to complain? Of course he does! It is wrong to steal from anyone in the first place. Suggesting the robber rob banks instead of houses only strengthens the robber's belief that it is all right to steal from others. It is wrong for an individual to initiate force against someone, like taking without consent, and it is wrong for the state to initiate force against someone, like forcing people to pay taxes without their consent. Since it is wrong to initiate force, and since states can only get away with initiating force with consent from masses of people, the people should refuse to vote.
It is wrong for a state, or anyone else, to initiate force. Initiating force is when aggression is used against non aggressors without their consent. If someone threatens to kill another, that is initiating force. If the person being threatened kills the person who is threatening him, that is not initiating force. Although the would be killer doesn't consent to being killed, he is threatening to use aggression against a non aggressor without his consent. If a person wants to die and asks someone to kill him, the killer is not initiating force. The person being killed consents to being killed. When a state makes a law, it applies it to everyone within its claimed territory. When a state levies a tax, it levies it on everyone within its claimed territory. The state makes no distinction between voters: people who consent to the state, and nonvoters: people who don't consent to the state. Since nonvoters don't consent to the state, all laws enforced against them and all taxes enforced against them by the state are initiations of force. The nonvoter does not consent to the state, and when taxes are imposed on him, it is no different than when a freelance criminal robs him. In both cases, the money being taken is taken without consent from the rightful owner. Whether it is property, freedom, or life, taking anything from its rightful owner without consent or without being provoked by aggression is wrong.
State's can only get away with initiating force if masses of people in an area consent to it. Without consent, the state is nothing. It can write all the laws it wants, it can claim people owe it money, it can claim it is legitimate, but as long as masses of people do not recognize it as legitimate, it is not different than any other gang of brutes trying to gain money and power by intimidation and force. For a while it may be successful in taking money from a few people, and forcing its way on a few others, but eventually the abused people will catch up and bring the gang to justice. This does not happen with legitimate gangs, i.e. states. As long as states have consent from most of the people it claims to govern, it can get away with anything without answering to justice. It can steal by taxing, it can enslave by forcing people to fight in wars, and it can kill by participating in wars. There is no limit to what a legitimate state can do. In the American state, people give their consent by voting.
People should refuse to consent to the state. Since the state initiates force, voluntarily supporting the state is also initiating force. The voter is like the terrorist mastermind. Sure, the mastermind doesn't carry out the acts, but without him backing the actions of the actual terrorists, the terrorists would not be able to terrorize. The voter, by voluntarily backing the force of the state, makes it so the state can initiate force. This is the reason people should refuse to give consent to the state.
Since it is wrong to initiate force, and since states can only get away with initiating force with consent from masses of people, the people should refuse to vote. No one has a right to undelegated power. If a politician holds power over one person who does not consent to it, even if a million other people in the area consent to having that politician hold power over them, the politician is holding undelegated power over that one. Any action the politician takes is initiating force against that one. If it were not for the voters, the politician would not have any power backing his actions. The voters elevate the politician into a position of unjust power over others. Since it is wrong to elevate others into positions of unjust power, it is clear that all people should refuse to vote.
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