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To vote is a democratic right. In a democracy there is nothing more fundamental than having the right to vote. The government shouldn’t be able to take away a former felons right to vote because their rights were given to them by a democracy. When you are a former felon, that means that you have served your time, were then released, so you have your original democratic rights back. Society needs to realize that voting is not a punishable right. Some privileges are taken away from convicted felons, but not the right to vote. They should be able to decide who runs their country too. These rights shouldn’t be taken away because the felons should also be able to give there opinions on the stuff going on around them and because our rights were given to us to make our land better by our standards and what we decide and they also have already done all the conditions of there sentence. Because felons are still part of society, if they don’t get to vote, then not every one is represented, so it’s not a democracy The 15th amendment states: “the right of citizens of the untied states to vote shall not be denied or abridge by the United States or by any state on account of race, color or previous conditions.” Having committed a felony and having already been reprimanded for it is a “previous condition,” so it is not constitutional to keep that right away from a citizen who has a felony in their past. The U.S is an example of a democracy and to keep this society democratic, provision such as the 15th amendment, so we could stay a true democracy. social contract is abused when governments issue excessive punishment. In a social contract it says an act is moral if it does not infringe upon the rights of another but taking away a felons right to vote is infringing on their freedom of speech. Voting can not be infringed upon so it should not be taken away at all. In all fairness, it would only be right to reinstate the felon’s right to vote because they have already been punished. If more rights are taken after that, it would be the government committing the crime of infringing on the former criminals rights, and that is not democratic or just

A Reply to the above:

Just to correct some things above that could be bad for your case if you kept it how it is: 1) The 15th Amendment is a nod to the race issue and it states "previous condition of servitude" (as in slavery)...not previous conditions. So that kind of defeats that whole argument. If you really wanted to bring up the Constitution in the AFF argument, you could mention the 14th amendment which states "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States" then again, right after that it states "nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws" which some may interpret to be part of the "breaking the social contract" theory. But I believe since the sentence uses "nor" apart from "and" then the previous sentences can't be included in the whole "deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law" part. But it's a stretch, nontheless.. 2) You argument about social contract doesn't really follow through. The social contract states that if someone infringes upon someone elses rights, then it's justified that their rights should be taken away. So the argument that the Gov.t is infringing on felons rights doesn't make sense because someone could argue that because the felons infringed on someone elses rights, it's justified that their right to vote should be taken away. All in all, unless you can counter it, I'd stay away from the social contract issue when running the Aff case.

I liked how you kept on asserting the democratic element into it. I think it's a valid point that the resolution calls for a democratic society and a society is technically not democratic if all of it's citizens don't have the right to vote. All in all, I don't think the Affirmative in this topic can be easily won but the whole debate should be interesting to participate in.