In a democracy, while felons are serving their sentences, they’re deprived of the right to vote amd Im okay with that. However, after seeving a sentence, the goal is to help the felon to re-insert in society. Now while few never re-insert fully in society, a lot are fully capable of bouncing back and becoming responsible citizens once again. Society should be accepting of these people, and one way to assure their being welcomed back in society is by giving them their basic rights, namely the right to vote. So to summarise, reinsertion of felons is very important, and can not be done properly if they’re not granted basic rights.

I understand, and I’m for depriving them of the right to vote while they serve their sentences. However, after having served long and painful sentences, if we keep punishing them by pushing them away from society, then it could create hostile environments for them which could push them to recidivism. And that way, we throw away all the progress that has been made during the sentence, and that cost taxpayer money.

That’s the case in these two states, but not the case in many others and in most countries of the world. Your gut feeling valid, but we need to push reflection far beyond that to come up with efficient policies and laws. Fighting crime is all about creating better citizens and avoiding recidivism. Punishing is just a way to ensure safety while working on improving and reintegrating of the ill functioning citizens. Not allowing them to vote is neither helping reintegrate nor is it guaranteeing the safety of anybody, it is just continuing to punish some people beyond their sentences, and that is unfair. Now while I think most felons could vote as they return to being responsible citizens, some shouldn’t, like for example a corrupt ex-president or a mayor, as they will have proven that they aren’t fit to lead. So my final proposition would be that felons could have the right to vote, only after serving their sentences. This right shouldn’t be reestablished automatically, but rather with a judge decision or something of that sort.