Most Americans won’t vote in the upcoming elections. This both saddens and angers us.

If you’re reading this, you have a greater chance of voting than most; newspaper readers tend to be voters.

We hope to inspire Enterprise readers to go to the polls on Nov. 3, and to bring their friends and neighbors with them.

A century ago, 80 percent of Americans voted. Now, in presidential election years, about 60 percent vote — a number that has been declining — and in election years like this one, just 40 percent vote.

What has changed in America to cause this slide? A century ago, most Americans worked six or seven days a week and there was no such thing as an eight-hour workday, so we can’t use our busy-ness as an excuse. Rather, voter apathy comes from a sense that, as communities lose their core, voting doesn’t matter; that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

We support a single, simple universal registration for voters in the United States that would shift our system from one where people have to opt-in, as it is now, to one where they have to opt out. European democracies that do this have much higher voter rates, from 70 to 80 percent.

Our country has a long and horrible history of using voter registration to exclude certain Americans from voting. In the early 1800s, many states adopted registration policies to exclude foreign-born transients from participating in local government. And, poor citizens were often away at work when assessors came by their homes to make up the voter rolls.

And then, in the South, Jim Crow laws kept African Americans from voting. After the Voting Rights Act of 1965, registration for black voters in Mississippi, for example, went from less than 10 percent to almost 60 percent in 1968.

Many states still had difficult registration procedures, meant to be alleviated by the National Voter Registration Act, requiring states to allow citizens to register to vote at local public offices like the department of motor vehicles or the welfare office, or by mail. Nine million new voters registered themselves once the bill took effect in 1995.

Universal registration run by the federal government would be the next logical step. There are still an estimated 61 million eligible American citizens who are not registered to vote and therefore can’t cast ballots.

Right now, New Yorkers can register to vote at dmv.ny.gov through the Department of Motor Vehicles’ online automated system, MyDMV. Using the online form is simple and easy, requiring just this information: a New York State driver’s license, permit, or non-driver ID; the last four digits of your Social Security number; and the ZIP code for the address on your driver’s license.

The deadline to register to vote in the Nov. 3 election is Oct. 9. If you haven’t already, you should register today.

We stop short of favoring a system like Australia or China where citizens are penalized for not voting. Casting a ballot should be an act of individual will.

That brings us back to the question of why citizens aren’t using their hard-won right to vote. We were appalled when, covering last month’s primaries, we discovered that only about 20 percent of eligible voters cast their ballots — and this is higher than some record-low turnouts in other places, hovering around 15 percent.

According to a recent report by the Center for the Study of the American Electorate, “As turnout goes down, so does the reservoir of political interest that breeds involvement….The core problem of participation does not reside in the realm of procedure, but rather in motivation.”

The report by the not-for-profit, nonpartisan center lists a number of contributing factors for the decline in motivation, including: campaigns run on attack ads that give the citizen a perceived choice between bad and awful; a decline in faith that government will address major societal needs; increased inequality that has the collateral effect of reducing hope for those at the bottom; a majority of the young people growing up in households in which their parents don’t vote and a larger majority who hear no discussions of politics or public affairs; and inadequate civic education in the schools.

The center also cites: the fragmenting effects of modern communications technology that has made grazing the Internet a substitute for reading the news; preoccupation with one’s cell phone and its narrow personal community at the expense of interpersonal discussion and participation in a broader community; the rise of consumerist values at the expense of values that would promote community and collective engagement; and, finally, the reduced coverage of politics in the visual media.

One of the solutions offered in the center’s report is that states, as many on the west coast do, provide voters with an information pamphlet that gives the biography, the self-ascribed issue positions of each candidate, and the pros and cons of ballot propositions written by proponents and opponents.

This is precisely what our newspaper does. Rather than presuming to tell voters our views in an editorial endorsement, our reporters talk to each candidate in local elections to understand their stances on the issues important to you.

Mary Ellen Johnson of the Guilderland Historical Society recently emailed us, saying, “I don't know how I would vote in a local election without having carefully gone over the paper's candidate profiles. As both a reader and an amateur historian, I don't know what I would do without it.”

Last week, we ran issues-based profiles for Guilderland candidates. This week, we’re running them for Westerlo candidates. We’ll do this for each town in our coverage area and for the county legislative races, too.

We believe that local elections have a direct effect on everyday lives. So the percentage of voters should be as high or higher than in a presidential election.

Besides setting your tax rate and besides deciding how your money is spent, local leaders affect everything from how your town transfer station is run to how your town will appear and function now and in the future. Just look at the passion that played out on our pages inspired by a single issue like the expansion of the Stewart’s in Altamont — a zoning matter that will ultimately be resolved by the elected village board.

If you live in Westerlo, you should read the profiles in this week’s paper. See how your views line up with those who are running. For example, if you’re a long-time resident, you may support the incumbents’ view that town-wide revaluation isn’t needed because it keeps your taxes lower. But, if you’re new to town, you may prefer one of the challengers who think its only fair to revalue so that everyone pays a fair share.

If you have friends or neighbors who don’t read the paper, share your copy. Engage them in conversation about the issues. Make democracy in your town work.

If you live in Guilderland, and you missed last week’s profiles, read them online. Go to see the candidates in person at the Oct. 29 forum at Guilderland High School, from 7 to 9 p.m., for a League of Women Voters event supported by The Enterprise.

Get involved in the dialogue that unfolds on our pages week in and week out. Write a letter to the editor about the issues that are important to you just as John Haluska, for example, has done this week on Guilderland’s lack of enforcement of a new law to upgrade derelict buildings.

Take your responsibilities as a citizen to heart. For a democracy to work, each and every one of us needs to be engaged. Vote out leaders who aren’t working for your interests; vote in those who are. Teach your children the value of voting and discuss at the dinner table your ideas and concerns. Don’t complain if you don’t vote.

Why let other people decide your future?
— Melissa Hale-Spencer