I presume many of the people who are against 18-year-olds voting are against it because they think they are a little too radical but still we know that the students are more to the right-of-center than their professors, are they not?

Senator GOLDWATER. I did not want to get into that, but, as long as you have brought it up, I think the polls that are available today show that the young people are inclined to react more favorably toward conservative ideas, without even knowing that these ideas are conservative. So, that might be a cause for my wanting this, but it is not. I think that they will pretty much follow the pattern of their parents.

In the last poll that I recall, it showed that 57 percent of the American people reacted more toward the conservative thought than they did towards the liberal. The liberal people in this young group are to be found in the college professors running from 25 to 35. Now, at about 35 they begin to find out that things are not that way, and if you can just get them through that 10-year period faster, I think we all would be better off. But that is beside the point.

Senator FONG. In my State, the voting age is 20. We had a constitutional convention, and introduced a provision to allow voting at 18. This measure was passed by the electorate, but when referred to the people, it was defeated. My State is considered to be a very liberal State, as you can see by our delegation here. We have four in Congress, and I am the only Republican. It is very peculiar that my State, which is very liberal, should turn down voting at 18. Now, many States, as you have pointed out-10 States have turned voting at 18 down since 1960, and, as you also said, 10 more will be called upon to vote on that question.

Now, even if strong representation by the States that 18-year-olds should not be given the right to vote, do you still feel that Congress should push ahead and give them that right by statute? Senator GOLDWATER. I think the Congress can.

Senator FONG. Yes; I know.

Senator GOLDWATER. I believe it should. I think the time is here, and it is going to happen.

If it does not happen in this Congress, it is going to happen in one of the coming Congresses.

Now, where these States have held referendums on the question the vote has usually been very close, and that is a reason, very frankly, there has been very little effort done to change this, change the opinion of the older people. I have been trying for some 20 years in my own State to get this accomplished through the legislature or through a State constitutional amendment, and contrary to the way your State is constituted, our State is a conservative State, both on the part of Democrats and Republicans, and we have not had any luck. But, on the other hand, I have not had any luck in getting organizations like the Junior Chamber of Commerce to get out and plug this. This is one of the hurdles that we do not seem to be able to get over. Another factor is there does not really seem to be a universal desire among these young people to have that right to vote. I find the young people who are 17 or 18 almost as equally split on this question as their fathers and mothers.

That is why I suggested to the chairman that we go home and, if we believe in it, talk about it.

Senator FONG. Yes.

Senator GOLDWATER. I do think it is right.

Senator FONG. I find that the young people also are divided on this question, but, like you, I believe they should be given this right. I think they are mature and rationally and emotionally capable of exercising that right to the advantage of our Nation.

Now, you feel that we should push it through by statute, and if the Supreme Court should rule otherwise, then pose a constitutional amendment?

Senator GOLDWATER. I would prefer a constitutional amendment, but I think the way has been made clear by decisions of the Supreme Court even though I may disagree with those decisions for the Congress to act. And, contrary to what some liberals believe, the conservative goes along with what the law is, not what he wishes it could be.

Senator FONG. Although you prefer a constitutional amendment, you feel that the Congress should not be deterred and should proceed with the statute, is that correct?

Senator GOLDWATER. Yes. Well, the Congress did pretty much the same thing in the 1965 Civil Rights Voting Act. They ruled that all Indians, for example, had the right to vote. Now, they have the right to vote in my State. That had always been a question, and, in fact, we were not allowed to become a State until we agreed to several provisions, one being that we could not sell whiskey to the Indians and the other one was that Indians could not vote. But in 1950, the Congress changed that. The Indians did not particularly care to vote, and the white man insisted. Some of them do not happen to like our political institutions; we are not very high on their totem pole. But if we have already changed voting laws once by statute, I think we can do it again. I see no great difference between saying that every American can vote whether he can read or write and saying that every American can vote who is over 18.

Seantor FONG. Well, I think you have given us a lot of reasons why the Supreme Court would rule the statute would be constitutional, and, again, on behalf of the subcommittee, I want to thank you for your presence here. You have helped us considerably. Senator GOLDWATER. Thank you very much.

Senator BAYH. Senator Thurmond?

Senator THURMOND. Thank you, Senator.

Senator Goldwater, I just wanted to say that we are delighted to have you with us and that you have made a very impressive statement here. Thank you very much.

Senator GOLDWATER. Thank you.

Senator BAYH. Senator Cook?

Senator Cook. Senator, I appreciate the plug very much.

There is one thing I do want to bring out in the bill that you and I and others will introduce today. We have provided for an effective date of January 1, 1971, which should eliminate all the problems of court review.

Let me ask you this: Is it your impression-and we noted this last year, we saw a defeat in New Jersey by a rather sizable mar

gin, in the State of Ohio by a rather close margin. Do you feel that what caused the defeat in either of the respective States is the result of what you refer to as the media coverage of what is known as the young media adult, not the actual young adult?

Senator GOLDWATER. I think it has a bearing on it. I would say that it was not the fundamental or the largest reason. I think the major reason-there are three counting the media-is an impression about young people. The fact that this is an emotional thing by some older people and that 21 has been a number that has been fixed in the minds of men for almost 200 years in our country, and, literally, thousands of years around the world. The other reason is that there has not been a real selling job done on this. I would like to see President Nixon keep talking about this. I think a strong presidential statement would be very well worthwhile.

Senator Cook. Well, the thing that amazes me about this, though, Senator, is that in the State of Georgia they gave to 18-year-olds the right to vote in 1942. And in the State of Kentucky, we gave the 18-year-olds the right to vote in 1954, and they commenced voting in 1955. There really was not great advertising campaign to get these things over. They were passed by the State legislatures on two occasions, and they were placed on the ballot, and in our State it was passed by over 2 to 1.

The thing that bothers me about it is that I think because of the advertisement that the small percentage of young people have gotten in this country by way of television, that it is now necessary for those who want this right to put on a major advertising campaign, and this concerns me.

For instance, let me go on a little further.

You said that you would like to have a camera follow you, and you talked about your son's activities on the college campus. Dr. Hayakawa testified before this subcommittee that he begged the television people to come and see the effect of things that were being done at San Francisco University, and they would not come. But the only time they would come would be every noon when, as he said. 750 out of 18,000 would gather every day at noon to cause some problem in center-campus and of which he considered 350 to be students, and it might be interesting to note, Senator, that of the 350 students that he said he felt were really involved, the average age of those students was 23 years old, and the average age of the leadership was 24 to 30, so they already had the franchise to vote, and they were merely depriving the 18- and 19-year-olds of that right.

Senator GOLDWATER. As I have said, I have asked the networks and the commentators that I know to just travel with us when we visit college campuses, not to hear what we have to say that is not important-but to see the reactions of the different students to different questions. I told Dr. Stanton, when he got all upset about the Vice President's charges, that he could blame himself in large measure on this, because he had been showing nothing but the young people who tear things up, and the parents of America know that this is not true. The parents know whether their kids are bad or good, and they do not like to have their children lumped together;

so, they are beginning to doubt the true worthiness of the news media. I think this has had a large impact on the thinking of the general American public. I recall, I think, that Gallup reported something over 80 percent of the American people reacted favorably toward the Agnew attack, and I think the time has come to strengthen the conviction across this country that our kids are not bad. Governor Reagan of California, told me that of 1,300 people who were demonstrators at a college of 82,000, there were only 600 of them even students. And we have had a little problem at the University of Arizona the other day, not a big problem. As you know, there is a strong feeling by the blacks against the Mormon Church, and we play Brigham Young and some blacks protested, and it got a little rough.

Well, it turned out that the majority of them were not students, on both sides, whites or blacks, but they are the ones that made the front page of the paper, not the young people who are pitching in and trying to help things.

So, I believe that the press and the media, if they are as liberal minded as they seem to be, could very well take this thing on as a cause. This is merely an extension of a basic right that all people have in this country, in my opinion, because they are citizens of the United States.

Senator Cook. Let me ask you, on this business of whether you need a constitutional amendment to provide that one can vote at 18-years-old, Why would those that want a constitutional amendment set a specific age with such an amendment in the Constitution today, when there is no such amendment now?

Senator GOLDWATER. Well, I will speak from my past.

Until the Supreme Court made its decision, I thought the States had not given the Federal Government, under the 10th amendment, the right to determine voter qualifications. Now, it is quite clear to me that in several recent cases the Supreme Court has given us this opportunity. It is quite clear to me that in 1965, we did tell the states that such restrictions could not be applied as to Indians, or to Negroes, and so on. In fact, everybody in some seven States was allowed to vote, whether he could read or write or not. Fundamentally, I would think better of a constitutional amendment. But to me, that has been decided by the Supreme Court, until we legislate otherwise or the Court reverses its decision. That is the rule of the game.

Senator Cook. I think you have brought out a very interesting point in your statement, because when women's suffrage went into existence, it did not go into existence for national elections alone. but when the poll tax went into existence, the 24th amendment, it did cover Federal elections alone. A very interesting point in your statement, was United States v. Texas, in 1966, when the Court sustained the power of Congress to prohibit the use of poll tax as a prerequisite to voting in State elections. Although the Court recognized that the poll tax system in Texas had the important function of serving as "a substitute for a registration system," it held that payment of the tax as a precondition to voting must fall, because it restricted "one of the fundamental rights included within the concepts of liberty."

In essence, the Court was saying, since Congress had passed a Statute pursuant to section 5 of the 14th amendment that it was not necessary for the Congress of the United States to adopt the 24th amendment, and it was not necessary for the required number of States to adopt it, because they ruled in 1956 that although the 24th amendment dealt exclusively with Federal elections Congress could have acted pursuant to section 5 of the 14th amendment to prohibit poll taxes in all elections. I think this is very interesting in the point that we are trying to develop, and this is that nowhere in the Constitution does it say "21."

Senator GOLDWATER. That is right.

Senator Cook. Nowhere does it say any age. Many States have 21, one has 20, one has 19, and two have 18. So, the only point is: Are we the one to lead or are we going to be led by the constitutional restrictions in a number of States, because of past history? I want to close with this, because I think Senator Fong brought this out:

He said: "Do you think we ought to pursue this even though we have the records from many States that they do not want it?" Well, I do not want the young people to get concerned that we may not do this because some States do not want it, because I would suggest that a majority of the Members of the Congress and a majority of the Members of the Senate voted sometime ago to impose a 10 percent surtax, and they voted to continue it, and I do not think there was anybody in the respective 50 States that wanted it done. So, I can only say to you that I do not think we should put this on the basis of the fact that because a State has turned it down that, therefore, I have a mandate to vote against what you think really is logical, and that is that the 18- and the 19- and the 20year-olds are a viable and absolutely important part of this society today, and have a tremendous amount to contribute and should contribute it.

I want to thank you very much for your statement.
Senator GOLDWATER. Thank you.

I might say that when we got the Volstead Act and I cannot remember, I was quite young at the time, but I cannot remember my father being enthusiastic about it, nor any of the visitors that came to the house, and we finally had to repeal it.

I will close with this: Let us give it a try, and let us pass your bill, and this will give the States a chance to have it heard before the courts. I think it is very wise that your bill be introduced. I do not like the idea of trying to tack it onto the voting rights bill. We have not really had sufficient testimony on it, and I would hope that your bill will receive thorough consideration by this subcommittee and by the full Committee on the Judiciary, I want to thank you again. gentlemen, for allowing me to be with you. It has been a real pleasant experience.

Senator BAYH. Thank you very much, Senator. We appreciate the contributions you have made.

Our next witnesses are Mr. James Brown, Jr., the national youth director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and Miss Philomena Queens, the youth regional chairman