Evaluation skills requestion: Electoral College

[Kanary]

I was accosted on the street by someone with a petition, asking me to sign. I'd never heard of this group (Make Your Vote For President Count Committee), and he said there is a web site, but I can't find it through google. He also said that this has been passed by Nebraska and Maine, and I'd like to have some input here on their proposal.

What they seem to be wanting to do is to apportion the state into districts according to how many electoral votes the state is entitled to, and each district would then get an electoral vote for who won the popular vote. In other words, rather than winner take all in the state, the votes would be according to each district.

Anyone know anything about this?

Anyone have any input how this would actually play out?

Perspiring minds need to know. :)

TIA

Kanary

[troublemaker]

1. It's a terrible idea state-by-state

Apportionment is a good thing but no state should adopt this policy unless all do simultaneously. (Doing so is unilateral political disarmament.)

Take California as an example. It's our most populous State and thus the most important State in deciding Presidential elections, having 54 electoral votes. If a State goes 60%-40% for a candidate that's considered a run away victory, so say Kerry gets 60% in California. As it stands now he would get 54 electoral votes.

With proportional apportionment California's electoral votes would be split; something like 33 for Kerry and 21 for Bush. So California would, in practical terms, represent 12 votes worth of decision-making power in the electoral college.

Meanwhile let's say Tennessee goes for Bush 52%-48%. Fairly close. But because Tennessee does things the old way they designate all eleven of their electors for Bush. Thus a close election in a smallish State negates a landslide election in our biggest State.

Now one can reasonably say that 40% of Californians is a lot of people--much larger than Tennessee--and those many millions are utterly disenfranchised by California sending a unanimous slate.

Fair enough! But when you elect a governor of a State 52%-48% they make one person governor, not split the time in office 52-48 between the two candidates. So in that sense the losers are always "utterly disenfranchised."

It can be argued either way but I think the most democratic course is for States to apportion electors, so I agree with proportional apportionment of electors provided two things: 1) all States must employ the same system, whatever that system is, and 2)the electoral college must be reduced to one vote per seat in the House of Representatives to eliminate the current state of affairs where a Wyoming voter in a Presidential race starts out with almost three votes for every one vote cast by a Californian.

Do the math--it's shocking! By population Wyoming deserves 1 vote and California deserves 52 but instead Wyoming gets 3 votes and California gets 54. California is 52 times larger but only gets 18 times more votes! A Wyoming voter is worth 2.88 Californians.

Since Republicans love to point out that Democrats can't win without black voters (though they never explain why they think that's a significant fact) we ought to point out at every turn that Republicans cannot win a Presidential election anymore without the built-in fraud of an electoral college system that values the votes of individual Americans differently based on where they live. (If little rural States didn't receive electoral college welfare it wouldn't have mattered who won Florida)

(Of course, with these proposed changes there would be no on-going reason for the electoral college at all because the thing was designed for the express PURPOSE of letting little states decide Presidential elections.)

[Kanary]

2. Can you say more?

I appreciate your opinion, but I need to know some facts and basis.

Thank you.

Kanary

[troublemaker]

3. more added

[troublemaker]

4. As a practical matter...

If you live in a state that never seems to go your way in Presidential elections sign the petition. If your State usually goes the way you want then don't--hang onto your disproportionate power.

[Kanary]

5. OK

I was hoping for info to help actually understand it better, and to be able to talk with others about it, but......

OK.

Kanary

[NavajoRug]

8. Many of your points are worthwhile, but . . .

. . . your comparisons of the "value" of voters in Wyoming and California aren't really valid. Using a term like "built-in fraud" to describe the Electoral College is totally incorrect.

One thing many Americans don't understand is that a presidential election is not -- and never was -- intended to be a "nationwide" election. It is actually a combination of 51 individual elections, with the Electoral College set up to reflect a "balance" in power among individual states similar to the two Houses of Congress. The House of Representatives is apportioned based on population, while all 50 states have equal representation in the Senate.

The Electoral College is no more "fraudulent" than the U.S. Senate. You don't hear too many people complaining that Wyoming has as many votes in the Senate as California does.

[NavajoRug]

6. At least two states already do this . . .

Maine and Nebraska, I think. Nebraska, for example, has two Congressional House districts -- so it gets four electoral votes (2 for the House districts and 2 for the Senate seats). The winner in each district gets one electoral vote, and the overall winner gets the two "Senate" electoral votes.

I don't think, though, that there has ever been a presidential election in which the electoral votes were split between two candidates in either state. In every election since this system has been in place, the winner of these two states has also won in each district.

A larger state is more likely to split its electoral votes under such a scenario, especially if there is a clear split between urban and rural districts.

[leyton]

7. I think it allows too much redistricting.

Much as we have redistricting for Congress, we could have redistricting for the electoral college. Now, Texas couldn't really do to much to make itself go any more towards Bush. But there are blue states with red state legislatures (Pennsylvania, Michigan, even New York and Minnesota are split) where we could lose big because of this.

I think we either keep the current system, modify the current system to do away with the two extra votes (as someone above explained), or just eliminate the college all together. So I don't recommend signing on to this initiative.