Should 16 Year Olds Be Able to Vote?

[Forsher]

For the unaware, NZ's Supreme Court (stupid name; it does not have supreme powers) has declared that under NZ law preventing sixteen and seventeen year olds from voting is age discrimination. Since I'm interested in the subject and it's now topical (for me, anyway), I thought it would be fun to use the principled reasons the Court deployed to base a thread about the issue on. Unfortunately, it turned out they made the call based on legal technicalities (which you can read about here) but you could do with a few more details to just satisfy your own curiosity... and flesh the OP out a little.

So, yeah, the specific technicality is that age discrimination starts at 16 in New Zealand (per legislation) so absent a reason to nominate 18 specifically NZBORA is internally inconsistent (and neither the Attorney General nor NZBORA gave such a reason). Given that the second largest party in parliament is opposed to lowering the voting age, this lack of a principled reason (though, perhaps, some are discussed in the judgment, which I haven't read because it's long) strikes me as a weakness given the ball is actually in parliament's court (from the linked article):

A recent law change from Parliament means that any declaration of inconsistency from the courts is put up for special debate.

Tipler said that they are confident the law will change.

“There is a formal process for Parliament to look into the declaration of inconsistency and we are very optimistic that once Parliament reviews the decision they will see that lowering the voting age is the right thing to do.

This optimism seems extremely misplaced in light of a subsequent announcement where it became clear that (1) a 75% majority will be required but neither National nor ACT are for reducing the voting age and (2) that the Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, is for change. Frankly, I don't believe Ardern given both my prior analysis (from the old version of this OP, see the link) and that she doesn't clarify whether she'll encourage her own party, Labour, which holds an outright majority of seats in parliament, to vote for change.

So, despite little prospect of change in New Zealand, what say ye, NSG? Should sixteen and seventeen year olds be entitled to vote?

Ironically given my condemnation of the absence of principle (again, the old version of the OP), I hold that the voting age should be tied to the school leaving age... which is 16 NZ. However, I have made an argument there that says it should be fourteen... in a certain sense, if you're entitled to be "home alone" then we have decreed that you are mature enough, responsible enough and capable enough to make decisions absent supervision and therefore you should be able to vote. In NZ, that age is 14.

[Farnhamia]

You might refer to where this is happening in the title.

[Eahland]

Sure, why not?

[American Collectivism]

You may want to change it to New Zealand Supreme Court. For a few seconds I thought you were referring to the U.S and was confused

[Har Yarok]

Ah, I thought this was going to be about the Supreme Court of Bangladesh. I was confused as I didn't think they were hearing a voting age case.

[Ilikejunkingcardsistan]

Yes, and I thought this was a roleplay thread.

[Sordhau]

It takes absolutely no time at all to type "NZ" my guy. I mean really. The overwhelming representation on NSG, and NS in general, is American. With such an over-representation to the point of cultural dominance how many people--even non-Americans--are really going to look at that title and think "Ah, of course, the Supreme Court of New Zealand"?

[Forsher]

It takes absolutely no time at all to type "NZ" my guy. I mean really. The overwhelming representation on NSG, and NS in general, is American. With such an over-representation to the point of cultural dominance how many people--even non-Americans--are really going to look at that title and think "Ah, of course, the Supreme Court of New Zealand"?

Clickbait is clearly a foreign concept to you.

Anyone else does this and it's a non issue. How do I know? Because everyone else does do it and it's a non issue.

[El Lazaro]

Good news for the citizens of Nauru. I’m excited to hear President Kun’s opinion on this.

[Sordhau]

It takes absolutely no time at all to type "NZ" my guy. I mean really. The overwhelming representation on NSG, and NS in general, is American. With such an over-representation to the point of cultural dominance how many people--even non-Americans--are really going to look at that title and think "Ah, of course, the Supreme Court of New Zealand"?

Clickbait is clearly a foreign concept to you.

Anyone else does this and it's a non issue. How do I know? Because everyone else does do it and it's a non issue.

I take issue with it whenever I see it so try that line on another girl.

[Free Algerstonia]

Clickbait is clearly a foreign concept to you.

Anyone else does this and it's a non issue. How do I know? Because everyone else does do it and it's a non issue.

I take issue with it whenever I see it so try that line on another girl.

hey sordhau... ya.... ya like jazz?

[Forsher]

Clickbait is clearly a foreign concept to you.

Anyone else does this and it's a non issue. How do I know? Because everyone else does do it and it's a non issue.

I take issue with it whenever I see it so try that line on another girl.

Cool beans.

I should additionally point out that you know this can't be a thread about America because if it was, it would have to be in the American politics thread. If you are deceived by my clickbait, the fault is entirely yours.

[Major-Tom]

Ah, the NZ Supreme Court, that makes more sense.

I saw the title and, for a second, wondered if 6 out of 9 justices had their drinks spiked before issuing a decision.

[The Black Forrest]

It takes absolutely no time at all to type "NZ" my guy. I mean really. The overwhelming representation on NSG, and NS in general, is American. With such an over-representation to the point of cultural dominance how many people--even non-Americans--are really going to look at that title and think "Ah, of course, the Supreme Court of New Zealand"?

Clickbait is clearly a foreign concept to you.

Anyone else does this and it's a non issue. How do I know? Because everyone else does do it and it's a non issue.

Wellllll. NZ Supreme Court would have been a nice thing as there are many who clicked thinking “they did what?….”

[Forsher]

Clickbait is clearly a foreign concept to you.

Anyone else does this and it's a non issue. How do I know? Because everyone else does do it and it's a non issue.

Wellllll. NZ Supreme Court would have been a nice thing as there are many who clicked thinking “they did what?….”

I think it has become apparent that the clickbait has just become a distraction, rather than attracting more attention to the issue. Thus I have changed the title entirely. Also, I had to edit the OP anyway to update with more current news.

[Forsher]

Original version of the OP, explaining why it was a legal technicality.

Indeed? Let us examine their reasoning... which unfortunately the article the headline is from does not.

Apparently there were four questions:

• can the courts actually do anything here?
• does the NZ Bill of Rights' specification of democracy for people 18+ modify the same statute's protection against age discrimination?
• if (2) is false, is that discrimination justified per section five of NZBORA?
• if (3) is false, should the lower courts have told parliament that an inconsistency exists?

See paragraph 4 in the judgment which you can download here. Fortuitously it seems the logic behind the Court's answers to these questions can be found in the media release, which you download from the same place. The answers to these questions turned out to be boring so I stuck them in a spoiler:

Regarding the first question, the Court found that it could do something:

the majority rejected the argument for the Attorney-General that the constitutional nature of the issues meant the Court should not inquire into the question of
inconsistency at all. The Court did not see that approach as consistent with its role, particularly where fundamental rights are involved

As NZ is an actual democracy, the people (via representative democracy) are empowered to decide what is and isn't constitutional, not random judges. I can't be arsed checking but the article says "A recent law change from Parliament means that any declaration of inconsistency from the courts is put up for special debate", so I would interpret that as saying the courts have been given more power to do things like this.

The second question might seem to have devolved to literalism but since statute defines how to read legislation in NZ, it didn't actually:

The majority also addressed the effect of s 12 of the Bill of Rights. Section 12 guarantees “[e]very New Zealand citizen who is of or over the age of 18 years” the right to vote in parliamentary elections. The majority agreed with the Court of Appeal that, applying a rights consistent interpretation, s 12 simply defines the minimum extent of the right to vote, not the maximum. In other words, the voting age can be lowered without breaching s 12 but not increased.

NZBORA describes its own purpose as "to affirm, protect, and promote human rights and fundamental freedoms in New Zealand" (also other things) so I do think it would be difficult to say "well, the legislation only says 18+ therefore only 18+" (which is basically how SCOTUS is reading the US constitution these days).

On that third point we see that age discrimination is defined in NZ to begin at 16 so that was basically a win by default (for now):

Unlike other comparable jurisdictions, in New Zealand the protection against age discrimination expressly begins at age 16. For that reason, in agreeing with the Court of Appeal that the Attorney-General had not established that the limit on the right was a reasonable limit in terms of s 5, the majority considered it was necessary to show why 18 was chosen as opposed to 16 or 17. The Attorney-General had not sought to do so. In the circumstances, the s 5 test had not been met. The possibility was left open that the limit could later be held to be justified and this possibility was reflected in the wording of the declaration.

This is irritating because basically I was looking for a principled reason that would make for a more interesting thread but, no, it was the lack of a principled decision for 18 that swung it.

So finally we come to the fourth question where we see some level of disingenuity:

Finally, in determining that the Court of Appeal was wrong not to make a declaration, the majority was not persuaded that to do so would be premature or that the issue was of such complexity so as to hamper the Court in fulfilling its usual function. And other factors supported granting the declaration, including: that the case involved the protection of the fundamental rights of a minority group that did not necessarily have effective avenues to pursue a challenge; and the obligations applicable under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child

We ignore the UN all the time but the disingenuity I refer to is that in a democracy it is notoriously the case that only voters have effective avenues to contend with the decisions of governments.

Okay, so it turns out the Court didn't make a principled decision and instead basically made this call based on the fact age discrimination starts at 16 in New Zealand (per legislation) so absent a reason to nominate 18 specifically NZBORA is internally inconsistent (and neither the Attorney General nor NZBORA gave such a reason). Given that the second largest party in parliament is opposed to lowering the voting age, this lack of a principled reason (though, perhaps, some are discussed in the judgment, which I haven't read because it's long) strikes me as a weakness given the ball is actually in parliament's court (from the linked article):

A recent law change from Parliament means that any declaration of inconsistency from the courts is put up for special debate.

Tipler said that they are confident the law will change.

“There is a formal process for Parliament to look into the declaration of inconsistency and we are very optimistic that once Parliament reviews the decision they will see that lowering the voting age is the right thing to do.

It is not clear from the article what Prime Minister Public Relations/Labour thinks. I would assume they're also opposed to lowering the voting age, honestly... likewise the allegedly libertarian party ACT. Ah, here's an old quote from Ardern:

"I wouldn't rule it out in the future but let's get civics right first, let's support our young people to learn about politics," Ardern said.

As Labour is currently forcing through changes to reduce the amount of social inquiry in NCEA, the assessment system, I'm going to go ahead and call this a coded "no". Also, a substantially similar Bill was rejected by ACT, Labour and National (and an independent former Labour MP now out of parliament) only in September. However, the only other time an inconsistency was declared, some level of change manifested so there may remain hope.

Anyway, what say ye, NSG? Should sixteen and seventeen year olds be entitled to vote?

Ironically given my condemnation of the absence of principle, I hold that the voting age should be tied to the school leaving age... which is 16 NZ. However, I have made an argument there that says it should be fourteen... in a certain sense, if you're entitled to be "home alone" then we have decreed that you are mature enough, responsible enough and capable enough to make decisions absent supervision and therefore you should be able to vote. In NZ, that age is 14.

[Sordhau]

I take issue with it whenever I see it so try that line on another girl.

Cool beans.

I should additionally point out that you know this can't be a thread about America because if it was, it would have to be in the American politics thread. If you are deceived by my clickbait, the fault is entirely yours.

Yes, obviously people never post news related to the US outside of the AmPol thread.

[Forsher]

Cool beans.

I should additionally point out that you know this can't be a thread about America because if it was, it would have to be in the American politics thread. If you are deceived by my clickbait, the fault is entirely yours.

Yes, obviously people never post news related to the US outside of the AmPol thread.

Not politics news, no.

[Stellar Colonies]

How about 15 year olds?

[Vistulange]

How about 15 year olds?

You might be posting in jest, but this is more or less what I keep coming back to. Yes, 18 is ultimately an arbitrary age limit, so is 16, yes, yes, it's all arbitrary—but surely there's a lower limit that makes sense. So, what is it? How do we determine what the lower (and if we really want to get controversial, upper) limits of voting?

[Drongonia]

No, absolutely not.

"Oh but it's a human rights violation" ok I literally do not care. It's also painfully obvious that the Green Party is only pushing this to get themselves more votes, as they appeal to a younger demographic which is easier to tug on the heartstrings of.

The voting age should be 21 anyway.

Also as a Kiwi you should probably have made it more obvious this is about the Supreme Court (which is not supreme) of New Zealand, as saying "The Supreme Court" is an instant invocation of the United States justice system.

[Stellar Colonies]

How about 15 year olds?

You might be posting in jest, but this is more or less what I keep coming back to. Yes, 18 is ultimately an arbitrary age limit, so is 16, yes, yes, it's all arbitrary—but surely there's a lower limit that makes sense. So, what is it? How do we determine what the lower (and if we really want to get controversial, upper) limits of voting?

Yep.

[Dogmeat]

I doubt it makes a significant difference to move the arbitrary line a couple of years.

[Suriyanakhon]

How about 15 year olds?

You might be posting in jest, but this is more or less what I keep coming back to. Yes, 18 is ultimately an arbitrary age limit, so is 16, yes, yes, it's all arbitrary—but surely there's a lower limit that makes sense. So, what is it? How do we determine what the lower (and if we really want to get controversial, upper) limits of voting?

18 is the age of majority where someone has all of the rights and responsibilities that come with being an adult. It makes the most sense to be the age where someone can vote.

[Anduk Hessen]

I wouldn't trust my past self at 16 to make good decisions in politics so I think 18 should be the voting age