That Pesky Electoral College

Friday, November 2, 2012

I 'm about to give up. I've been defending the Electoral College for years against the admittedly somewhat meritorious argument in favor of simple popular election.

If you're a student of this peculiar feature of the Constitution, you will recall that its invention was one of the many compromises needed to get all the states to sign on. You will also realize that we live in a republic, not a democracy, and that, in theory, it is the states that elect a president, not millions of individual voters.

In practice, our system has produced four elections in which someone has won the electoral vote without winning a simple majority of votes cast. At this point, there appears at least a fair chance that it could happen again, with my guy on the losing end in the College.

That is not why I'm changing my tune, however. I can live with a minority president. It just doesn't seem worth arguing about anymore. I've been worn down.

The case for the Electoral College has been that it forces candidates to tour the country rather than focus solely on large cities with all their votes. My own view has been that, as a practical matter, it also limits the number of candidates, theoretically simplifying the election process, and eliminating the need for runoff elections.

I have reached the point where I don't give a damn. Our system has become such an endless, bloated, money-driven mess that it can't possibly be any worse, and if a popular election would drive candidates to cities, look what the present system does: It drives them to Ohio.

Have you heard anything discussed in the news for the past three months but "swing states"? When was the last time either presidential candidate appeared in New York, California or Texas except to raise money?

If the president were chosen by popular vote, Republican candidates would have to show up in California, where, even though Democrats hold the state in a hammerlock, there are still millions of Republicans - far more than in many solid red states. The reverse is true in Texas.

The obvious problem with changing to popular election is that the Constitution has to be either amended or circumvented. There are some awkward, half-baked schemes for circumvention, and who knows, something might actually come to pass, with all the usual unintended consequences to be determined later.

But the real problem is that our system of government is inferior to a parliamentary one - that used by most democracies on the planet. Our system isolates the president from the legislature, setting up exactly the divisive situation we have now, and by discouraging multiple parties, facilitates polarization within the legislature itself. If no single party controls the legislature, compromises must be made.

It also virtually guarantees interminable, expensive elections. In a parliamentary system, elections are called on relatively short notice, and an unpopular prime minister can be removed with a vote of no confidence.

Oh, well. Why ramble on about this notion? It's not going to happen, at least not without a constitutional convention or some very messy transition to an entirely new government.

For the time being, we are stuck with what we've got.

I have a feeling that should Mr. Obama turn out to be the next minority president, the movement for a constitutional amendment would pick up a lot of steam, and the Electoral College could be toast.

In the meantime, here's an idea that would save most of us a lot of angst and make our politics a lot simpler and cheaper: Let's just make the governor of Ohio president too.

Fred Wolferman lives in Southern Pines. Contact him by e-mail at fwolferman@sbcglobal.net.

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Toyboy52 6 months, 3 weeks ago

Are you suggesting that i will be in the last class of the electoral college when i vote for President this December ?

toto 6 months, 2 weeks ago

A survey of North Carolina voters showed 74% overall support for a national popular vote for President.

Support was 75% among liberal Democrats (representing 13% of respondents), 78% among moderate Democrats (representing 24% of respondents), 76% among conservative Democrats (representing 11% of respondents), 89% among liberal Republicans (representing 3% of respondents), 62% among moderate Republicans (representing 16% of respondents), 70% among conservative Republicans representing 21% of respondents), and 80% among independents (representing 12% of respondents).

Support was 75% among respondents living in Democratic state House of Representative districts (representing 59% of respondents) and 72% among respondents living in Republican state House of Representative districts (representing 41% of respondents)

By age, support was 69% among 18-29 year olds, 71% among 30-45 year olds, 77% among 46-65 year olds, and 72% for those older than 65.

By gender, support was 81% among women and 65% among men.

NationalPopularVote.com

toto 6 months, 2 weeks ago

With National Popular Vote, every vote would be equal. Candidates would reallocate the money they raise to no longer ignore 80% of the states and voters.

With National Popular Vote, big cities would not get all of candidates’ attention, much less control the outcome. The population of the top five cities (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston and Philadelphia) is only 6% of the population of the United States and the population of the top 50 cities (going as far down as Arlington, TX) is only 15%.

Suburbs and exurbs often vote Republican.

If big cities controlled the outcome of elections, the governors and U.S. Senators would be Democratic in virtually every state with a significant city.

A nationwide presidential campaign, with every vote equal, would be run the way presidential candidates campaign to win the electoral votes of closely divided battleground states, such as Ohio and Florida, under the state-by-state winner-take-all methods. The big cities in those battleground states do not receive all the attention, much less control the outcome. Cleveland and Miami do not receive all the attention or control the outcome in Ohio and Florida.

The itineraries of presidential candidates in battleground states (and their allocation of other campaign resources in battleground states) reflect the political reality that every gubernatorial or senatorial candidate knows. When and where every vote is equal, a campaign must be run everywhere.

With National Popular Vote, when every vote is equal, everywhere, it makes sense for presidential candidates to try and elevate their votes where they are and aren't so well liked. But, under the state-by-state winner-take-all laws, it makes no sense for a Democrat to try and do that in Vermont or Wyoming, or for a Republican to try it in Wyoming or Vermont.

Even in California state-wide elections, candidates for governor or U.S. Senate don't campaign just in Los Angeles and San Francisco, and those places don't control the outcome (otherwise California wouldn't have recently had Republican governors Reagan, Dukemejian, Wilson, and Schwarzenegger). A vote in rural Alpine county is just an important as a vote in Los Angeles. If Los Angeles cannot control statewide elections in California, it can hardly control a nationwide election.

In fact, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland together cannot control a statewide election in California.

Similarly, Republicans dominate Texas politics without carrying big cities such as Dallas and Houston.

There are numerous other examples of Republicans who won races for governor and U.S. Senator in other states that have big cities (e.g., New York, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts) without ever carrying the big cities of their respective states.

Candidates would need to build a winning coalition across demographics.

toto 6 months, 2 weeks ago

If an Electoral College type of arrangement were essential for avoiding a proliferation of candidates and people being elected with low percentages of the vote, we should see evidence of these conjectured outcomes in elections that do not employ such an arrangement. In elections in which the winner is the candidate receiving the most votes throughout the entire jurisdiction served by that office, historical evidence shows that there is no massive proliferation of third-party candidates and candidates do not win with small percentages. For example, in 905 elections for governor in the last 60 years, the winning candidate received more than 50% of the vote in over 91% of the elections. The winning candidate received more than 45% of the vote in 98% of the elections. The winning candidate received more than 40% of the vote in 99% of the elections. No winning candidate received less than 35% of the popular vote. With the current system of electing the President, no state requires that a presidential candidate receive anything more than the most popular votes in order to receive all of the state's electoral votes.

Not a single legislative bill has been introduced in any state legislature in recent decades (among the more than 100,000 bills that are introduced in every two-year period by the nation's 7,300 state legislators) proposing to change the existing universal practice of the states to award electoral votes to the candidate who receives a plurality (as opposed to absolute majority) of the votes (statewide or district-wide). There is no evidence of any public sentiment in favor of imposing such a requirement.

If an Electoral College type of arrangement were essential for avoiding a proliferation of candidates and people being elected with low percentages of the vote, we should see evidence of these conjectured apocalyptic outcomes in elections that do not employ such an arrangement. In elections in which the winner is the candidate receiving the most votes throughout the entire jurisdiction served by that office, historical evidence shows that there is no massive proliferation of third-party candidates and candidates do not win with small percentages. For example, in 905 elections for governor in the last 60 years, the winning candidate received more than 50% of the vote in over 91% of the elections. The winning candidate received more than 45% of the vote in 98% of the elections. The winning candidate received more than 40% of the vote in 99% of the elections. No winning candidate received less than 35% of the popular vote.

Since 1824 there have been 16 presidential elections in which a candidate was elected or reelected without gaining a majority of the popular vote.-- including Lincoln (1860), Wilson (1912, and 1916), Truman (1948), Kennedy (1960), Nixon (1968), and Clinton (1992 and 1996).

toto 6 months, 2 weeks ago

With the current system, it could only take winning a plurality of the popular vote in the 11 most populous states, containing 56% of the population of the United States, for a candidate to win the Presidency with a mere 26% of the nation's votes.

Americans do not view the absence of run-offs in the current system as a major problem. If, at some time in the future, the public demands run-offs, that change can be implemented at that time.

toto 6 months, 2 weeks ago

The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in the country.

Every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps. There would no longer be a handful of 'battleground' states where voters and policies are more important than those of the voters in 80% of the states that now are just 'spectators' and ignored after the conventions.

When the bill is enacted by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes– enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538), all the electoral votes from the enacting states would be awarded to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in the country.

The presidential election system that we have today was not designed, anticipated, or favored by the Founders but, instead, is the product of decades of evolutionary change precipitated by the emergence of political parties and enactment by 48 states of winner-take-all laws, not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Constitution.

The bill uses the power given to each state by the Founders in the Constitution to change how they award their electoral votes for President. Historically, virtually all of the major changes in the method of electing the President, including ending the requirement that only men who owned substantial property could vote and 48 current state-by-state winner-take-all laws, have come about by state legislative action.

In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). Support for a national popular vote is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in virtually every state surveyed in recent polls in recent closely divided Battleground states: CO – 68%, FL – 78%, IA 75%, MI – 73%, MO – 70%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM– 76%, NC – 74%, OH – 70%, PA – 78%, VA – 74%, and WI – 71%; in Small states (3 to 5 electoral votes): AK – 70%, DC – 76%, DE – 75%, ID – 77%, ME – 77%, MT – 72%, NE 74%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM – 76%, OK – 81%, RI – 74%, SD – 71%, UT – 70%, VT – 75%, WV – 81%, and WY – 69%; in Southern and Border states: AR – 80%, KY- 80%, MS – 77%, MO – 70%, NC – 74%, OK – 81%, SC – 71%, TN – 83%, VA – 74%, and WV – 81%; and in other states polled: AZ – 67%, CA – 70%, CT – 74%, MA – 73%, MN – 75%, NY – 79%, OR – 76%, and WA – 77%. Americans believe that the candidate who receives the most votes should win.

The bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers in 21 states. The bill has been enacted by 9 jurisdictions possessing 132 electoral votes - 49% of the 270 necessary to go into effect.

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