Should there be a test to vote?

A test for voting lets more mature people vote

Question: Should there be a test to vote?
Position1 of 2›: Yes, there should be tests for voting
Argument‹3 of 3: A test for voting lets more mature people vote

Maturity is attributed to wisdom and knowledge. Maturity helps companies run better, make peace in society, and improves lives. Voting tests would attract more mature voters for the sake of a better country.

The argument

Proponents of this position argue that voting tests would let mature people vote, and they define the term narrowly: maturity is the ability to use wisdom to make a good decision. The argument then runs as a short chain. If voters were mature, they'd vote for better political candidates and leaders, and having better political leaders would improve the country and government. Each link is a claim about consequences rather than about desert, since the case is not that some people deserve the vote more, but that the quality of an electorate determines the quality of a government. The premise underneath that chain is that voting is a skill as well as a right. Voters need to have sufficient knowledge and intelligence to make the correct choices at the ballot that will lead to prosperity, and proponents observe that many people vote without truly knowing what they're voting for. They add that people with prejudiced opinions, or opinions that will bring about destruction, can vote as well, and that nothing in the current arrangement filters for any of this. The historical claim is offered as precedent for the principle. The very reason the United States was designed as a republic instead of direct democracy, on this account, is that the founding fathers knew that highly qualified, knowledgeable people, such as the electoral college and the senate, should be making the important decisions for a country, not random citizens. If that judgement was sound at the founding, proponents argue, then the principle of filtering decisions through competence is already built into the system, and a test merely extends it. The conclusion is therefore framed as a qualification rather than an exclusion: a test to vote would ensure that citizens who want to participate in electing public and government officials have the maturity to lead the country in a positive direction.

Premises

[P1]Maturity is the wisdom to make good decisions, and mature voters would choose better leaders. [P2] Many people currently vote without real knowledge of what they are voting for. [P3] The US was designed as a republic precisely because the founders trusted important decisions to qualified, knowledgeable people. [C] Therefore, because a voting test lets more mature people vote, there should be a test to vote.

Counter-arguments

Maturity is subjective. Someone’s idea of maturity is different than another. The designers of the test will be inherently biased and design the test to what they believe is maturity. Their idea of maturity will only be one conceptualization of maturity; no single test can accurately identify every single person that is mature enough to make good decisions. Requiring a maturity test in order to vote infringes upon a persons' right to elect officials into office. In addition, even "mature" people do not all hold the same beliefs, so only mature people voting would not prevent conflicts arising from varying political opinions.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Not everyone who passes the test will be a mature voter. You can’t test maturity because maturity is subjective. [Rejecting P2] Although making wise decisions will benefit the government, people are flawed and selfish. Even if the right politician was voted for, they are imperfect and prone to making mistakes.

Framing

Only mature people should be eligible to vote.