“Tell Your Mama/Vote For Obama” the bumper stickers and T-shirts read. These artifacts are being promoted by school age kids who are too young to vote as they try to influence their parents to cast their ballots for the Democratic senator from Illinois. College students also are petitioning their parents to support Barack Obama. Some parents have changed their preferences and even left the Republican Party, at the behest of their children, to vote for Obama.

There are several reasons, observers say, why students are able to prevail on their parents to back a candidate. Compared to other generations, parents have become less authoritarian and more like their children’s peers. Parents want to be friends of their offspring and parent-child discussions are more like talks between equals rather than a laying down of rules. Thus, parents are more receptive to political suggestions. Additionally, some parents are proud that their children are interested in politics and see in them a reprise of the things they were passionate about while growing up.

The surge in youth activism recalls earlier years. Minnesota Senator Eugene McCarthy’s 1968 presidential campaign was helped by those who joined him in opposing the Vietnam War. Young voters as well as mothers of draft-age sons aided McCarthy’s attempt to become the Democratic nominee. After the draft ended in 1973, the U.S. went to all-volunteer armed forces. Without a draft, the Iraqi war has not been much of a flashpoint for college students. But now, to use Bob Dylan’s words, “The times they are a-changin’.”

Obama has sought out young voters, especially those in college. The Internet has been one of his favorite means of contact. A nonpartisan group, the Pew Internet & American Life Project, reported in June, “A record-breaking 46% of Americans have already used the Internet for politics this election season and Barack Obama’s backers have the edge.” Obama’s ability to attract voters with varied views has confounded the pundits who assign voting patterns based on race, gender and age.

Students have been paying their own way to come South to volunteer for Obama, much as students did in the 1960s to work for civil rights. Young voters are less concerned about some of the issues that divide older voters, such as religion, race, abortion and gay marriage. Youth are concerned about the rising cost of education, the environment, the economy and the Iraqi war.

For three consecutive biennial elections, 2004, 2006 and 2008, the numbers of young people voting have risen for the first time since the voting age was lowered to age 18 in 1971, according to the nonpartisan Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement.    An exit poll in April showed that in the Democratic primaries 6 of 10 voters younger than 30 supported Obama. His promise to “move beyond the divisive politics of Washington and bring Democrats, Independents and, yes, Republicans who are disillusioned with our current course together to get things done” seems to best express their ideals.

While Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton had a cadre of youth volunteers, it was never as extensive or effective as Obama’s. Now the youth vote becomes a contest between Obama and Senator John McCain.

Obama said to a group of young potential voters, “Young people are voting at rates we have not seen in the history of this country. It’s your generation that can imagine not just the world as it is, but the world as it could be.”

The youth vote has been largely responsible for making Obama the presumed Democratic nominee. Whether it can help send him to the White House remains to be seen. If he wins, his election will be the first in which the youth vote will have been so crucial. If he loses, young voters, hopefully, will be astute enough to know that learning to deal with disappointments without disillusionment is one of the hallmarks of growing up. They should be aware that hard work and enthusiasm are important but may not be enough to secure a victory. No matter what happens on Nov. 4, they should remain committed to his ideas as well as their own so they will

George E. Hardin

not be turned off from political participation.    

(George E. Hardin worked as a photographer, reporter and editor, and in public relations during a long career before he retired. His column appears every other week.)

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