Americans Historically Demonstrate Massive Ignorance of Citizenship

But were more engaged in 2020 than in other years. Will it continue?

“Two out of three Americans cannot pass the U.S. citizenship test taken by new immigrants. When asked to name just three of the thirteen original states, only 28% of survey respondents could… One-fourth of Americans do not know that freedom of speech is guaranteed in the First Amendment. Sixty percent of Americans can’t identify which countries we fought in World War II. That is roughly the same percentage of people who do not know there are nine justices on the Supreme Court.” — Source: Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, 2018.

Given this massive ignorance, it is not surprising that about a quarter of eligible Americans, or one out of four, according to a 2012 survey, are not registered to vote. Almost never have two out of three citizens voted in a presidential election — only in 2020 did Americans come close, due to the extended periods for early voting and ease in voting absentee due to covid.

Of the 75 percent of eligible citizens who are registered to vote, somewhere between 54.2 and 62.3 percent of them actually voted in presidential elections between