Protecting Voting Rights: Good for America, Good for American Business

"A government of the people, by the people. A beautifully American ideal, but a reality denied to many for much of this nation’s history. As Americans, we know that in our democracy we should not expect to agree on everything. However, regardless of our political affiliations we believe the very foundation of our electoral process rests upon the ability of each of us to cast our ballots for the candidates of our choice. For American democracy to work for any of us, we must ensure the right to vote for all of us. We all should feel a responsibility to defend the right to vote and to oppose any discriminatory legislation or measures that restrict or prevent any eligible voter from having an equal and fair opportunity to cast a ballot. Voting is the lifeblood of our democracy and we call upon all Americans to join us in taking a nonpartisan stand for this most basic and fundamental right of all Americans."

This statement appeared as an advertisement in the New York Times and the Washington Post today, and was signed by hundreds of American business leaders, including myself.

The statement exists because former American Express CEO Kenneth Chenault and Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier led corporate America to take an active role in this situation, by explicitly advocating for the rights of all American citizens to make their voices heard through the core democratic act of voting.

Their leadership on this issue benefits both the business community and every American. Ensuring that every citizen who has the right to vote can exercise that right in clear, accessible, and expedient fashion is not a partisan issue. It's an American issue, because free and fair elections, with a high degree of civic participation, are ultimately how our government achieves its moral legitimacy. As I've written in the past, it's what creates the "consent of the governed."

And yet in virtually every state in the U.S. right now, legislative efforts to pass laws explicitly designed to make voting less accessible, more complicated, and downright unpleasant are underway. In fact, what prompted Chenault and Frazier into action was the passage of a sweeping new law in Georgia that reduces drop boxes and mobile polling places; imposes new bureaucratic burdens on absentee voters; and even makes it a crime for people who aren't poll workers to provide "food and drink" to voters within 150 feet of a polling place. Seriously! In Georgia, you can now be thrown in jail, for up to a year, for offering a bottle of water to a would-be voter who's been standing in line for hours to exercise their Constitutionally-protected right to participate in our democracy.

I think one reason so many business leaders and corporations have taken up Chenault and Frazier's call to action is that we recognize the contradictions and absurdities in so-called ‘voting reform’ efforts across the country. As business leaders, we strive to make the products and services our companies create as useful and accessible as we can. We want our customers to use them. We want to broaden our customer bases. Similarly, in a democracy like ours, we should strive to create more civic participation and an increasingly engaged electorate. Our base orientation should be toward making voting more straightforward and inviting. As Twilio CEO Jeff Lawson puts it, "In a society where you can hail a ride with your phone, you should be able to vote just as easily. In a society where you're rarely more than a mile away from a bag of Doritos and a cola, your polling place should be just as close."

Of course, when business leaders and especially corporations take a stand on political issues, they often get criticized on the grounds that corporations should function in a deliberately disengaged and non-partisan fashion – because taking explicit stands on political subjects can potentially alienate customers, partners, and their own employees. In fact, this often occurs when users publish posts with a political aspect on LinkedIn.

But to tell corporations to just shut up and sell, as Mitch McConnell and others did when corporations like Major League Baseball and Coca-Cola took stands against Georgia’s voting law, fails to acknowledge the role that corporations and business in general play in America’s civic life. Simply put, corporations are stakeholders in the communities they serve. They create jobs. They generate tax revenues. They often help define a region’s character and traditions as well as its economy. As a result, business leaders aren't always just business leaders. They can be civic leaders too. Societal leaders.

So while corporations should be choiceful about when and how they speak up, they are not and should not be voiceless on political matters. In fact, they have both obligations and interests to speak up in certain situations.

And this is definitely one of them. The premise that every American citizen has a right to vote is foundational to our American identity. Personal enfranchisement is what gives individual citizens a stake in America. It helps establish rule of law and the consent of the governed, and these characteristics are key for enabling the stability and trust that make business and entrepreneurism possible. As I wrote in my book Blitzscaling, "Society provides the ecosystem in which you live, and in which your business operates, which means that it can rightly claim some responsibility for your success. In other words, your success is contingent upon society functioning properly."

In contrast, efforts to unfairly disenfranchise individuals creates instability. They weaken the conditions that promote business and entrepreneurism. So corporations have both a moral duty as civic stakeholders and a business interest to speak up and act when core democratic rights and values, like the right to vote, are threatened.

As Kenneth Chenault and Kenneth Frazier noted in an earlier statement they issued, this isn’t just a Georgia issue. Dozens of other states "are rushing to impose new and substantial burdens on voting following an election that produced record turnout for both parties." In Texas, for example, legislators are on the verge of passing new laws that would prohibit drive-through polling places and other mechanisms that make voting more accessible.

Opposing such anti-democratic efforts isn't a partisan fight. Or at least it shouldn't be. Instead, we should view improving voter access as a patriotic goal uniting every citizen and elected official in our shared national commitment to creating a government "of the people, by the people, for the people."

Business leaders and corporations with any sense of duty to America and its ideals must actively oppose ongoing campaigns to restrict and remove voting rights in Texas, Arizona, and dozens of other states. Politicians should not try to silence any American voices speaking for citizens' right to vote.

A citizen’s right to vote is key to America’s democracy and its prosperity. We need legislators who understand that, and who are committed to making voting even more accessible for every citizen. This position is both pro-business, and more importantly, pro-American.