Last updated on: 9/3/2010 | Author: ProCon.org

Alec C. Ewald, PhD Biography

Title:
Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Vermont
Position:
Pro to the question "Should People Who Have Completed Felony Sentences Be Allowed to Vote?"
Reasoning:

“[T]he case for barring people convicted of crime from voting is not a practical one at all, but a jumble of conjectures, ill-informed fears, and mystical images of the body politic, all piled on top of social theories three hundred years in age….

At a minimum, proponents of any restrictive policy in a modern democracy must explain how the proposed exclusion would strengthen our democracy and protect the public good. Advocates of disenfranchisement fail that test.”

“An Agenda for Demolition: The Fallacy and the Danger of the Subversive Voting Argument for Felony Disenfranchisement,” Columbia Human Rights Law Review, 2004
Involvement and Affiliations:
  • Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Vermont, 2006-Present
  • Visiting Assistant Professor, Union College, 2004-2006
  • Expert Witness at request of counsel for Plaintiffs, Farrakhan v. Washington, provided written report on felon disenfranchisement, 2006
  • Report Author, “A ‘Crazy-Quilt’ of Tiny Pieces: State and Local Administration of American Criminal Disenfranchisement Laws,” prepared for The Sentencing Project, 2005
  • Grant recipient from The Sentencing Project for research on role of state and local officials in implementing disenfranchisement law, 2004
  • Instructor of Political Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, 2001-2004
  • University Fellowship, University of Massachusetts. Won funding for half-year release from teaching duties in university-wide competition; completed research and writing of “‘Civil Death’: The Ideological Paradox of Criminal Disenfranchisement Law in the United States,” Wisconsin Law Review, 2002
  • Teaching Assistant, Dept. of Political Science, University of Massachusetts, 2000-2001
  • Congressional Quarterly Press Award, Best Paper by a Graduate Student, Law and Courts Section of the American Political Science Association, for “Getting Ready for Garza? Judge Emilio Garza, Civil Liberties, and the Politics of Judicial Selection,” 2000
  • Teaching Assistant, Dept. of Political Science, University of North Carolina, 1999-2000
  • History Teacher, The Putney School, Putney, Vermont, 1992-1998
Education:
  • PhD, Political Science, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, 2005
  • MA, Political Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2000
  • BA, Political Science and International Relations, Tufts University, 1992
Other:
  • None found
Quoted in:
  1. Does the Social Contract Theory Present a Valid Reason for the Disenfranchisement of People with Felony Convictions?