With almost three-quarters of eligible voters going to the polls, Wisconsin not only ranked second in the nation in turnout last fall, but was one of only three states where turnout was higher in 2012 than it was in 2008.
Why are people in some states more apt to vote than people in others?
And why do people vote in such large proportions in Wisconsin, where (despite concerns about “voter fatigue” last year) the state had its highest turnout for governor and second highest turnout for president in more than half a century?
“It’s a complicated soup of things, a combination of culture and history and demographics and election laws and what’s happening in the current campaign,” says Barry Burden, political scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. [cont.]
Craig Gilbert, Journal Sentinel