It's Time to Junk the Electoral College

[Bill McBlueState]

By JONATHAN SOROS

In his election-night victory speech, Barack Obama said he would be a president for all Americans, not just those who voted for him. But as a candidate he didn't campaign with equal vigor for every vote. Instead, he and John McCain devoted more than 98% of their television ad spending and campaign events to just 15 states which together make up about a third of the U.S. population. Today, as the Electoral College votes are cast and counted state-by-state, we will be reminded why. It is the peculiar mechanics of that institution, designed for a different age, that leave us divided into red states, blue states and swing states. That needs to change.

The Electoral College was created in 1787 by a constitutional convention whose delegates were unconvinced that the election of the president could be entrusted to an unfiltered vote of the people, and were concerned about the division of power among the 13 states. It was antidemocratic by design.

Under the system, each state receives votes equal to the number of representatives it has in the House plus one for each of its senators. Less populated states are thus overrepresented. While this formula hasn't changed, it no longer makes a difference for the majority of states. Wyoming, with its three electoral votes, has no more influence over the selection of the president or on the positions taken by candidates than it would with one vote.

We often forget that the power to appoint electors is given to state legislatures, and it is only because they choose to hold a vote that Election Day is at all relevant for us. Nowhere is a popular election constitutionally required. And, as the 2000 election reminded us, the winner of the popular vote is not guaranteed to become president.

Continued here: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122930124441705413.html

[flyingfysh]

1. You HAVE to do something else first

First, you have to have a nationwide system of voting with paper ballots, and uniform procedures for voting.

Else, corruption in one area can produce enough bogus votes to overwhelm honest votes cast elsewhere. With the electoral college, the effect of fraudulent votes is limited to the electoral votes assigned to the state.

[BrklynLiberal]

2. Direct election must be dependent on honest and open voting and vote counting.

[riqster]

5. Amen! nt

[cstanleytech]

18. Actually considering the size of our nation now we need electronic voting

the problem is we need to be able to trust it which is hard to do when you have a CEO for Diebold (now called Premier Election Solutions in order to hide from their past) who make the machines that register a persons votes promising to deliver a state to a specific party and or person like he did when he promised Ohio to Bush and then delivered on it.

[DavidDvorkin]

3. It's 221 years past time

But better late than never.

I'm pessimistic that it will happen. The emotional reluctance to let go of the EC, which will probably be illustrated in quite a few posts in this thread, is remarkably strong.

[DonCoquixote]

4. OK, answer this though

If you go 'direct", just based on population, what is to stop the major population centers from just steamrolling the smaller ones. Note I did not say states, because to be honest, the idea of small state=small pop is indeed outdated. Most states may have one or two major cities, and be rural (even northeast states like New jersey pretty much follow this pattern) While we may not like the heavy handedness of the Red States, we also do not want an election where all a candidate has to do is stop in a state's major city and know that the rural interests can get squashed like bugs.

[Bill McBlueState]

6. Rural interest would have to play politics just like everyone else

Rural interests would have to find a way to get the majority of the population (or at least a majority of the relevant elected officials) to support their ideas, just like anyone else does.

Giving rural areas a disproportionate influence in the election is surely not the only way to get their needs addressed.

[TechBear_Seattle]

7. With Murdoch's ownership, the Journal isn't even trying to appear educated and informed any more

If a state has reliably voted for your party, it is a waste of resources to campaign hard there because the state will almost certainly be yours anyway. If a state has reliably voted for the other party, it is a waste of resources to campaign hard there because the state will almost certainly go to your opponent. The best use of resources is to focus on the small number of states considered to be "up for grabs," I those that could be yours if you can manage to sway enough people to your side. No change in the Electoral College is going to alter that fundamental strategy.

Second, the fact that Wyoming has three Electoral Votes rather than just one means that it can still be important. Eliminating the Electoral College would effectively remove Wyoming -- and Montana, Vermont, Delaware and both Dakotas -- from having any influence on the national election. Why would any state want to disenfranchise itself and diminish its influence?

Lastly, the United States is not now nor ever has been a democracy: we are a republic. The states, not the people, are represented in Congress and the states, not the people, elect the President and Vice President. The closest our system of national government gets to being a democracy is that the people pick who will represent the state in such matters. (State governments are a republic-democracy hybrid, with districts being represented in the state legislatures and statewide officials such as governors being elected directly by the people.) It constantly surprises me how many folks are ignorant of this basic fact of American civics.

[MineralMan]

8. Good explanation!

We are the United States of America. It is that fact that makes us unique.

[TechBear_Seattle]

11. Unique? Not true by any stretch

Mexico, Canada, Germany and Switzerland, just to name the first few that come to mind, all have systems of federal government very similar to ours. The Netherlands was formed as a federalist republic, too, although they picked up a hereditary sovereign, as well.

Both the Swiss Federation and the Dutch Republic are older than the United States. Switzerland began forming in 1291 when three cantons banding together for mutual aide; by 1353, five more cantons joined the federation. Together, they came to dominate the trade routes over the Alps and in 1499, with their defeat of an army raised by Holy Roman Emperor Maximillion I, declared de facto independence from the Holy Roman Empire.

The Netherlands was born between 1579 and 1581. The first date marks the creation of the Union of Utrecht, when seven northern provinces of the Spanish Netherlands (roughly, modern day Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands) banded together during the Eighty Years War in opposition to the rule of the Spanish Habsburgs. The second date marks when these provinces proclaimed the Act of Abjuration, when the provinces rejected the rule of Philip II and declared themselves an independent federation.

[Bill McBlueState]

9. It's not as though the WSJ is a lone voice on this

I could have posted any number of editorials calling for elimination of the electoral college. Katrina van den Heuvel shares the same sentiment here: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080721/kvh

It's true that the Founders set up a republic in the Constitution, but that doesn't mean the people are forever bound to specific aspects of republican government if, say, the nation has evolved in certain ways since its founding.

[TechBear_Seattle]

12. You are correct, but consider what is necessary to alter the Constitution

The people of three fourths of the states must ratify any amendment. Fifty states, so 38 states must approve. Another way of putting it is that it only takes 13 states to sink a proposed amendment; once 13 states vote down an amendment, ratification is no longer possible and the proposal is effectively dead.

There are a total of 538 Electoral Votes. Wyoming has 3, or 0.56% of the total. The United States has an estimated population right now of 305,896,000 people; Wyoming's estimated 2007 population was 522,830, or 0.17% of the US' total. A direct presidential election would see Wyoming's influence cut by almost a third. A similar decrease would be seen by about 15 other states, more than enough to sink any proposed amendment.

The Electoral College system helps give a voice to states with small populations and helps to temper the influence of states with large populations. It is not a perfect system; it is not a terribly good system. But like democracy, it is still better than any of the alternatives. If we were to rework our national goverment from a federalist model to a unary one (eliminate the concept of state, create federal Congressional districts based soley on population, have these districts resized every census and probably get rid of the Senate), then direct election of the President and Vice President might work, but I really don't think that is a road we should consider taking.

[suston96]

10. AGREED. 50+ states can hold auctions on eBay for those electoral votes -

The US Constitution leaves it up to the states to do as they please.

Clause 2:

Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.

"...in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct...."? A recipe for disaster. 50+ states - 50+ "manner(s) of choosing electors."

[TechBear_Seattle]

13. And yet, the system has worked for centuries

In fact, nearly every state has had the same manner of choosing Electors -- a winner-takes-all popular vote -- almost from the very beginning of our republic.

[suston96]

16. In 2000 the Repub FL legislature was in session, live on TV, about to pick its own......

....slate of electors if the popular vote did not turn out as uh, planned.

[TechBear_Seattle]

20. And as I remember...

Scholars of Florida law were saying flat-out that such an action would have been illegal: the Legislature had given up such authority a long time ago when they passed a law, duly signed by the Governor, giving that power solely to the people. Had the Legislature taken action, it would have caused a constitutional crisis in Florida and around the country over whether or not the Legislature can retroactively take back power that it had ceded to the people. It would have raised nasty questions on the federal level as well, about whether Constitutional authority given to state legislatures can be excercised even when ceded to the people, and whether such authority can be ceded at all.

I seem to remember, but I'm not sure, that such concerns were mentioned in regards to Bush v. Gore, that the US Supreme Court interceded to prevent the Florida Legislature from forcing such issues.

[uberllama42]

14. Wyoming et al. had absolutely no significance in this election

I don't think those six states averaged one campaign stop each in 2008. They are already effectively disenfranchised. If the National Popular Vote proposal passed, suddenly their residents would carry just as much weight as people in OH, FL, PA, and the other swing states. It would be one man, one vote.

Small states will never garner much attention because there are relatively few voters there. But in a popular vote system they would receive as much attention as their population justifies, which would be more than the zero they get now. They could only gain influence by moving to a popular vote system.

I don't entirely agree with your definitions of 'republic' and 'democracy,' either. A democratic institution is one that governs or otherwise makes decisions based on the will of the majority of the public. A republic is a system in which officeholders make decisions, based at least partially on their own ideology and expertise. The two are not mutually exclusive, since those officials can be elected by popular vote.

Electing legislators from districts does not make Congress completely undemocratic. Maybe it's less democratic than a proportional representation system, especially since the winner-take-all system squeezes out third parties. But districts don't literally elect legislators. Districts are political abstractions which matter because they are populated by voters. We say that the First Congressional District of Pennsylvania re-elected Bob Barr, but that is just a short-hand for saying that the majority of the voters in the district voted for him. For that reason, I think your distinction between a republican system and a democracy is a false one.

Under the original Constitution, our electoral system was not strongly democratic, but there has been an undeniable democratic shift in the years since. We have consistently expanded the franchise and amended the Constitution to elect senators by popular vote. The latter change directly undermined the idea that states as entities should have some representation in the federal government. As EC foes are fond of saying, dirt don't vote.

This process of democratization has created the expectation in recent decades that the Electoral College will reflect the popular vote. Why shouldn't we enshrine that in state law?

[TechBear_Seattle]

15. I believe you are wrong

Many of the states were considered "givens" to one party or the other, and neither party spent much time or money campaigning in those states. Instead, the vast majority of resources went to "battleground" states, which did not include Wyoming, Montana, Vermont, Delaware and both Dakotas. From early on, this past election -- like all modern Presidential contests -- came down to a handful of states considered necessary for a win. Eliminating the Electoral College will not change this fundamental tactic of resource management; it will simply switch from battleground states to battleground municipalities, with even larger swatches of the country ignored than under our current system.

I have demonstrated how Wyoming and other states would lose influence under a popular election. You assert otherwise, but offer no support for your assertion. Why should any candidate spend money to win Cheyenne -- or Anchorage or Boston or the District of Columbia, or any other municipality that consistently and solidly votes for one party or the other? Please, explain how Wyoming will experience a net gain of influence under a popular national election system.

As for the distinction between a republic and a democracy, the distinction is the amount of say the people have in their government. Under the Constitution, only one half of one third of the national government is democratically elected: the House of Representatives. Of all the different parts of national government, the House is by far the weakest, with Representatives serving only two year terms and one power exclusive to the House being national spending legislation. All other power held by the Legislative Branch is held by the Senate, which was filled by appointment of the state legislatures (until ratification of Amendment 17 in 1913.) And even then, it is the states and not the people who are represented in the House; the people merely decide who will represent the state.

Which, I will admit, is where I was incorrect. That the states are represented in Congress and elect the President is not because we are a republic; it is because we are a federation of states and not a unary body like France, Italy or the United Kingdom. The distinction between a republic and a democracy is the amount of control held by the people. In a democracy, the goverment is directly of the people; all 50 states are democracies, as the people directly elect statewide officials and representational districts have no sovereign existence. Constitutional democracies, to be precise, as the power of the people is defined and limited by a constitution.

In a republic, the people have little to no direct control of the government. The Roman Republic is a good example, as several Founders have written that it served as their model in crafting the Constitution. During the 450 years or so that the Republic stood, ruling authority was held by magistrates. The magistrates were elected and advised by various comitiae (assemblies of all people of a certain social rank or higher) and conciliae (assemblies of selected individuals) but received their orders from the Senate, made up of high ranking families and individuals. Rome was not a democracy, as the people did not control the government, nor were the people directly represented within the government. Rome was a republic because the people did have considerable input into government policy(at least, until the establishment of the Empire.)

You also seem to be confusing the concepts of a republic with that of representational democracy. Again, the distinction is not the organization of government but how much direct control is held by the people. Districts are semantic constructs with no purpose other than to create a constituency that elects a limited number of representatives; they have no existence except for this one purpose. State legislatures are democratic, in that state legislators directly represent their constituency and each legislator in the same house of the legislture represents nearly the same number of people. Congress, in contrast, was created to be less democratic: constituencies in different states are widely divergent in population, and while each Representative represents a constituency, they first and foremost represent the state

I do not disagree that, in the last two and a half centuries, the United States has become more and more democratic. I do find your phrasing somewhat incorrect, though: "We have consistently expanded the franchise and amended the Constitution to elect senators by popular vote." No, we amended the Constitution to elect Senators by popular vote only once, and a one-time occurance cannot logically be called a consistent expansion. Yeah, I'm being a debate fascist; I know what you meant. :hi:

I don't much like the Electoral College, but I believe that replacing it with a popular direct vote will create a worse system. My personal opinions aside, I just do not see how enough states would be willing to amend the Constitution and decrease what influence they may or may not have on the national elections. We can piss and moan all we want, but it just is not going to happen.

[uberllama42]

19. The way Wyoming's influence increases is that its voters would matter

on a one-for-one basis. A popular vote system would mean that all the Democrats in Wyoming matter just as much as the Democrats in other states. There would be an incentive to increase voter turnout in every state, so any presidential candidate would have to build a campaign in all 50 states. Democrats would go to Dallas and Houston because there are voters there. Republicans would go to Chicago and Boston because, even though they won't win a majority in either city, there are a lot of potential voters to be picked up there. This is even more important in the suburbs of those cities.

Harrisburg, PA is slightly smaller than Cheyenne, WY, and yet it received more attention than Wyoming, Delaware, Vermont, Montana and the Dakotas put together in the general election. Under the EC, Harrisburg matters vastly more than Cheyenne. It's perverse. A popular vote system would level the playing field. If any state would lose influence under the popular vote, it would be Pennsylvania. The swing states would matter only as much as their respective populations justified. Cheyenne will never be what Harrisburg was this year, but it does deserve parity, even if both of them end up being less important than larger cities.

I wouldn't expect the small states to be the ones to vote down a "nix the EC" amendment. I would look to Florida, Pennsylvania, and Ohio to be out front on that, and they could probably find another ten General Assemblies in second-tier states like Virginia, Colorado, and Missouri.

As for your debate-Nazism, I disagree that there's anything wrong with that sentence. It has two clauses:
1) "We have consistently expanded the franchise" and
2) "(We have) amended the Constitution to elect senators by popular vote."

"Consistently" modifies "have ... expanded" but not "(have) amended." Expanding the franchise to un-landed males, racial minorities, and women does constitute a consistent process, while Amendment XVII was a single change to the system. They are distinct, and I didn't mean to conflate them.

[TankLV]

17. Who can afford the TUITION anyhow nowadays?!