Like Maddie, I got involved in my first political campaign when I was twelve years old. I volunteered on the campaign for a politician named David Cohen, who was running to be mayor of Newton, Massachusetts. He won, and while I definitely didn’t play anywhere near as major a role in his campaign as Maddie did in Janet’s, I loved being part of it and feeling like my small actions were contributing to a greater cause I believed in.
What I learned then, and wanted to get across with Maddie’s story, is that government affects basically everything about how all of us lead our lives. It affects whether our parks are maintained, whether our drinking water is clean, whether our stoplights function, whether our neighborhoods are safe. Every day, we interact with government in so many ways that we don’t even think about. Journalist Christopher Hooks phrased it like this in an essay for the website Medium: “That’s what politics is—the way we distribute pain. It’s not a sport or a fraternity or a game. It’s how we determine who gets medication and who dies young, who learns in a class of twenty kids and who learns in a class of thirty, whose school has a counselor that’s trained to look for signs of sexual abuse and whose doesn’t.”
Because politics affects all of us almost all of the time, we should all understand the basics of how it works. As Mr. Valdez explains to Maddie, American democracy depends on a system of checks and balances. There are three branches of government:
The legislative branch writes and votes on laws. On the national level, this is the House of Representatives and the Senate, which together form the Congress. In Lawrenceville, this is the city council.
The judicial branch interprets how those laws are applied and decides whether those laws are constitutional. This branch is made up of judges, and the highest-ranking part is the Supreme Court.
The executive branch administers and enforces those laws. On the national level, the leader of this branch is the president. On the state level, it’s the governor. In Lawrenceville, it’s the mayor.
Each of these branches keeps one another in check, so no one person or part of the government can get too much power. When all power is consolidated in one person, it’s called a dictatorship.
The ultimate check on governmental power is the people. Citizens of a democracy get to vote for their governmental representatives, and if we don’t like what they’re doing, we can vote them out, protest their actions, or even run against them. Members of the government know that they could lose their jobs if enough people don’t approve of what they’re doing, so they have an incentive to listen to the people and try to give them what they want. Basically, we as a country are the employers of the lawmakers, and if they’re doing a bad job, we can fire them.
The media play a big role in helping the people exercise our governmental oversight. The internet, newspapers, magazines, radio, and TV keep us informed about what our elected officials are doing. That’s how we find out if our representatives are doing something we don’t like. It’s also how we find out if they are doing things that we like, which is how we know to support them in their campaigns.
If you want to make a difference in politics like Maddie and her friends, here are some things you can do:
COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR ELECTED OFFICIALS. Tell them what matters to you and what actions you want them to take. Like Maddie, you can go to a town hall, or you can show up at their offices to tell them in person. Or you can call, write letters, or send email.
JOIN ADVOCACY GROUPS. If there’s a particular issue you care about—the environment, smoking, gun control, school uniforms, or anything else—there is most likely an advocacy group that is working to make a difference in that realm, and they are usually looking for volunteers to help with their efforts. One way to find advocacy groups is through Charity Navigator (www.charitynavigator.org/). Social networks like Facebook and Meetup (www.meetup.com/find/movements/) can show you groups that are near you. And of course, asking other people who are politically involved to recommend groups is the best way to get personalized ideas.
FORM A CLUB AT SCHOOL. If you care about an issue that doesn’t already have a group at your school, start one yourself! Talk to a faculty member about starting a new student organization, invite friends to join, and use school-approved media (school newspapers, bulletin boards, assemblies, etc.) to spread the news about what you’re working on.
TALK TO OTHER PEOPLE. Studies show that you’re most likely to read a specific book or watch a specific movie if your friends recommend it to you. The same is true with politics. The number-one way to get other people to care about an issue that is important to you is to talk to them about it. This can mean talking one-on-one with friends, and it can also mean things like writing letters to the editor of the newspaper to reach a wider audience.
VOLUNTEER FOR A VOTING RIGHTS NONPROFIT. Nonpartisan groups like Rock the Vote (www.rockthevote.org/), When We All Vote (www.whenweallvote.org/), and the League of Women Voters (www.lwv.org/) work year-round to register voters and promote civic engagement. They need volunteers to help spread the message that people can (and should!) get involved in politics.
VOLUNTEER FOR A POLITICAL CANDIDATE. Even though presidential (and most mayoral) elections are held only every four years, every single fall brings a new election where other important offices are filled. Look at who’s on the ballot for the next election—you can find lists at websites like Vote411 (www.vote411.org/)—find out which candidates best represent your views, and sign up to volunteer. Like Maddie and her friends, you can do voter ID or get out the vote calls, block-walk, write postcards, hold signs, gather signatures, or all sorts of other things. You don’t need to do anything you’re not comfortable with—there are tons of different volunteer opportunities, so whatever your skills and interests are, there should be something you can do to help a campaign.
The government has an impact on pretty much everything, but all of us have an impact on that government. Now, my question for you is: what sort of impact are you going to have?