By Jim Damicis, Scarborough resident and Senior Vice President, Camoin Associates
Fall is election season. While there are no state and federal candidates on this November’s ballot, it is still an important one for Scarborough.
Two statewide ballot questions address issues that have received significant statewide and national attention: voter access and gun safety. The local school ballot questions pertain to a major spending decision to address long-researched and previously failed efforts to improve and expand school facilities. This will impact residents and their children for many years to come.
Given this significance, it is important that Scarborough voting-age residents turn out to vote! This raises the question: What does the data say about voter participation in Scarborough?
Data from the Scarborough Town Clerk indicates that in November 2024, the last presidential election, 82% of the citizen voting-age population that was registered voted. This was up from 78% in the 2016 presidential election and 80% in the 2020 presidential election.
Scarborough traditionally has a higher voter participation rate than Maine as a whole and the US. In November 2024, Maine’s voter participation rate was 67%, and that of the US was 65%, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
There will be no federal or state candidate elections this November. During “off” election years, turnout is typically lower, and recent data support this. This past June, according to the Scarborough Town Clerk, the town’s participation rate was 15%. The 2021 November election was a post-presidential ”off” election year, and according to data from the Maine Secretary of State’s Office, the participation rate for both Maine and Scarborough was 38%, all considerably lower than in presidential election years.
While this November election will not include races for president, governor, or other federal and state offices, it is an important one for the Town of Scarborough. To help motivate residents of the town to turn out, here is some context of major milestones in the right to vote in the US. It illustrates how much we, as citizens, hold voting rights as a tenet of a democratic society and a right for all.
Voting Rights in the US
1776-1800s: Property Requirements limit voting to white male landowners in most states.
1820s–1850s: Universal White Male Suffrage – Property requirements were dropped in most states.
1848: Seneca Falls Convention – First women’s rights convention in the U.S., calling for women’s suffrage.
1868: 14th Amendment grants citizenship and equal protection – but not explicit voting rights – to formerly enslaved people.
1870: 15th Amendment prohibits denying the right to vote based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
1920: 19th Amendment guarantees women the right to vote nationwide.
1924: Indian Citizenship Act grants U.S. citizenship and voting rights to Native Americans.
1952: McCarran-Walter Act grants naturalized Asian Americans the right to vote.
1961: 23rd Amendment allows D.C. residents to vote in presidential elections.
1964: 24th Amendment bans poll taxes in federal elections.
1965: Voting Rights Act bans racial discrimination in voting, outlawing literacy tests and empowering federal oversight.
1971 – 26th Amendment lowers voting age from 21 to 18 in response to the Vietnam War draft.
Sources: Scarborough Town Clerk, U.S. Constitution, National Archives, congress.gov, and supremecourt.gov
Photo by Element5 Digital
