ABSTRACT
After the middle of the nineteenth century, most attempts to introduce mandatory voting into the French electoral procedures were made by right-wing deputies and were supported by conservative authors; first by monarchists, and later by liberal or nationalist republicans. However, some draft proposals were also submitted by moderate republicans. Even though they were few in number, these republican bills constituted an important source of a different type of argumentation in favour of a voting obligation. Whereas monarchists were motivated by an interest in controlling the egalitarian effects of universal suffrage, republicans had the exact opposite aim: to establish a universal capacity to vote through a comprehensive programme of civic education. Both nevertheless agreed in depicting abstainers as moderate voters, which makes their summoning the best antidote against extreme political outcomes.
