If one more person during the election season told me they weren’t going to vote because their vote “didn’t matter,” I was going to throttle someone. The election just passed, and in the weeks and months leading up to it, I heard a lot of people say they weren’t going to vote because their vote didn’t matter. “We all know the way Massachusetts is going to vote,” is a common statement heard across the state. The last time Massachusetts voted Republican was 1984, for Reagan, after all. But voting does matter, because there’s more to it than just the federal election on the ballot, even though the Senate and Representative elections are fairly important as well.

State elections matter. Although most incumbents tend to run unopposed, like State Representative in General Court (for Middlesex, at least), a good portion of them are running against another candidate. It’s important to vote for your local candidates—like Councillor, which had two possible candidates running for the position this past election. The smaller positions, other than Representative and Senator, are important too, like the Register of Deeds, who, like their name suggests, oversees the registration process for deeds to properties (it dates back to the Mass Bay Colony, don’t ask why it’s an elected position to this day). 

And there’s the ballot question. The questions are, other than the presidential election, the hottest topics of election season. Almost all ballot questions are something the Massachusetts state legislature could not decide on, so they leave it up to the voters to decide. Some of the ballot questions are silly, and are just undecided because they involve the legislature themselves (Question 1: “State Auditor’s Authority to Audit the Legislature”), and some are more seriously debated, like Question 4: “Limited Legalization and Regulation of Certain Natural Psychedelic Substances” or Question 5: “Minimum Wage for Tipped Workers.” If you feel strongly about an issue on the ballot, then maybe you should go out and vote. 

It’s generally not a good idea to let voter count fall. Low voter turnout can lead to poor policy and leadership, and the majority can be unhappy if only the minority goes and votes. If you want your voice heard, state or nationwide, go out and vote! Your voice matters, and “my vote doesn’t matter” is an invalid statement.