One of three states that constitutionally require felons to permanently forfeit their voting rights - and requiring a lengthy process to regain them - Florida is changing its policy to allow most nonviolent offenders to automatically regain their voting rights.
The question surrounding the changed policy is this: how do voting rights relate to committing a crime? I'm curious what readers think. Should a convicted criminal forfeit their voting rights? While in prison? Forever? At all? Read up a bit more on felony voting rights at MSNBC and The Straight Dope.
The question on my mind is what purpose the former policy served. Are the loss of voting rights a deterrent to crime? (I believe this is a rhetorical questions). Is losing the right to vote while serving a sentence a significant addition to punishment? Should there be lifetime punishments for certain crimes?
Obviously, the issue of voting rights for felons taps a much deeper issue of the appropriate social response to crime. If one views the role of society to be to prevent crime, then some of the latest research suggests that punishment is a poor practice (pdf). In the United States, half of all criminals released in a 15-state study were reconvicted of a crime within three years. Is that the success of punishment?
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