Please Pass the Tylenol
Posted by Hazel Stone | Filed under Decision Eh
Hey, want a cranium-splitting headache? Then go do as I have been doing this past week, and read up on the electoral college, how electors are seated, and how this whole popular vote vs. electoral vote actually works.
And then won’t somebody tell me how we can do it better? Our whole lives we’re told, “one citizen, one vote.” We’re not told, however, that we’re really only voting for electors, not the actual candidates. It’s irritating, really, very star-chamber-esque. Despite arguments to the contrary, there has to be a better way… A way that didn’t originate in a time when citizens were outnumbered by buffalo, and communication was at the speed of horseback.
UPDATED TO ADD: While attempting to comply with Robb’s order (!), I ran across this article regarding Maryland’s implementation of the National Popular Vote:
A Stanford University computer scientist named John Koza has formulated a compelling and pragmatic alternative to the Electoral College. It’s called National Popular Vote (NPV), and has been hailed as “ingenious” by two New York Times editorials. (Ed: Not that that’s any particular recommendation, mind you…) In April, Maryland became the first state to pass it into law. And several other states, including Illinois and New Jersey, are likely to follow suit.
How NPV works is this: Instead of a state awarding its electors to the top vote-getter in that state’s winner-take-all presidential election, the state would give its electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. This would be perfectly legal because the U.S. Constitution grants states the right to determine how to cast their electoral votes, so no congressional or federal approval would be required. NPV could go into effect nationwide as soon as enough states pass it (enough states to tally 270 electoral votes—the magic number needed to elect a president). In 2008, NPV bills are expected to be introduced in all 50 states.
So, what’s the downside to this, eh? And for that matter, what’s the upside?
Tags: electoral college, i'm getting a headache
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February 13th, 2008
I’m a Brit, and I too have wondered about that. For some years now.
The way I’ve read it, the electoral colleges don’t even have to follow what the voters want, and there’s nothing the voters can do about it.
How do people get to be one of these electors . I don’t want to try digging that out for myself – I don’t want a headache.
And what if someone not one of the main parties is standing for election?
Hell, I’m getting a headache just asking the questions.
February 13th, 2008
If one state, even a small one, would have legislators brave enough; the back of the electoral college would be broken. The solution I see. Take the Presidency off the ballot for the General Election by changing the state’s process for selecting electors.
Let those legislators select the electors themselves on the day following the general election.
I’d be willing to bet that a Constitutional Amendment would be rapidly forthcoming after a single state [possibly] determines who has the electoral majority, possibly even splitting a party ticket.
February 13th, 2008
Telemakos, I’m sure then that you would agree that the winner of the World Series would be whoever score the most total runs rather than the team who won the most games? Right?
Hazel, please find a single instance of an election being won specifically by the E.C. casting votes against the voters’ wills.
No, it’s not a perfect system, but you absolutely do not want a pure, democratic system. Otherwise, NY and CA would decide everything for the rest of the country.
February 13th, 2008
Robb, you ripped that example from the “Math Against Tyranny” article.
And why *I* gotta do the research?? Just the fact that it CAN happen is enough for me to consider an alternate system, and why I asked for suggestions.
My original question stands…or actually let me rephrase it: What benefit is there to keeping a system in place that originated in a time when the population was MUCH smaller and widely distributed?
February 13th, 2008
Heck, why don’t some number of states (totaling 270 EV) just pass laws that say that they will give their delegates to whoever wins the popular vote in those states?
It would be just as legal as NPV.
February 14th, 2008
I can help the Lady out on this one…
On the several occasions where no Presidential candidate polled a majority of available elector’s votes, the Constitution passes the responsibility of selecting the President to the House (Amendment 12, Paragraph 3). There are a couple of instances where the “winner” of the electoral vote did not become President, because the House chose differently. The first example that comes to mind is 1824.
But the way you phrase it makes it impossible to answer, because while there have been several “faithless electors” over the years, the result of such events have never actually affected an election to any great degree.
Well, according to the proposed law change – where any given state gives it’s electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote – both NY and California (both of which voted Democratic in ’04) would have ended up giving their electoral votes to Bush instead, despite the wishes of the respective State’s voters.
And to answer Hazel’s question: the reason we still have an Electoral college is so that the Big Five States won’t control the nation, despite the possibly opposing wishes of the other 45 States.
It used to be a truism that the President needed to win the big States (CA & NY) to win the White House. Until Dubya, that is.
If it were not for the Electoral College, Bush would not have won. But imagine how you would feel about the Patriots claiming that they had advanced more yards than the Giants had in this last Super Bowl, therefore they should have won the game?
“Good thing we weren’t playing for yards gained, isn’t it?”
February 14th, 2008
This national popular vote idea completely removes the state as an entity involved in the national election. By which I mean “Ohio” won’t matter. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about that.
On one hand, it’s intuitively sensible that the guy who receives the most total votes should win the election.
On the other hand (this one takes a minute to reach its point and involves remedial civics for which I apologize) Congress is divided into two parts, as we all know. The House is populated in proportion to the populations of the states, while in the Senate every state has the same voice. The “people” get their say, but so do the sub-federal layers of government. It was intended for both to have a say. The electoral college is a weird system, granted. I completely misunderstood it in Mr. Lewis’ eighth grade civics class. But it gives the states the opportunity to participate in the election as states. Rhode Island can stand up to California, in a small way. Since the electoral votes are apportioned based in part on each state’s number of votes in the House of Representatives (the variable portion), the level of representation each state has is of a roughly equal resolution to their representation in the House. There’s the same amount of “pixelation” for lack of a better term. Whether that’s a good thing or not I can’t say. Worst case, it’s no more wrong about the will of the people than Congress.
Actually, the electoral college can be looked at as a mechanism for the state governments to moderate the excesses of the voting public. Which would make it the only factory-installed system I can think of that trusts The Government more than The People.
The best solution might be to make the victory threshold more than half-plus-one, so that no one can win by getting just over half the votes while the rest of the people would rather tear their own eyes out than see that person as President. If it were a two-thirds majority, moderate candidates with broad, centrist appeal would be mandatory.
The best argument I can come up with for keeping the Electoral College is that Al Gore apparently received more popular votes in 2000, if I remember correctly.
Or, the short answer: beats me.
February 14th, 2008
First and foremost, I’m not saying the system is perfect and shouldn’t be examined and changed if needed. But the thought of pure democracy in elections has more chances of failure than the system we have in place now.
Hazel, no I didn’t pull it from that article insomuch as I remembered that argument from a long time ago. I know the article you’re speaking of but I didn’t read through it. Many years ago I studied the whole EC thing because I was of the same mind – one person, one vote. I looked through it, realized it acted as kind of safety valve, then promptly forgot everything I read about it.
The reason I asked you to look for an election that was changed (and I should have used the term “via faithless electors”) is because I don’t know of one.
Personally, I don’t see why we need a President any more. 300,000,000 people in the US and we think one guy can run the whole show? B.S. I could understand electing people as the main representative of the US, but I can’t see why we give one person so much power.
February 14th, 2008
Oh but that’s one of the biggest myths going…that the President has all that much power. Which is why I (try to) never worry about Jackass A getting elected to office. There’s only so much damage they can do.
I’ll come back to the rest o’you guys here in a bit. *waves hands weakly in direction of coffee*
February 14th, 2008
Oh, I worry about Jackass A taking office because of jackasses a2 through a299,999,213 who think that he *does* have the power and continue to let him do what he wants. With Obama or Hillary, that scares the life out of me.
And it’s 7:44AM – I’m already on cup #3.
February 14th, 2008
I still favor the EC because it seems to be one of the few places where the State exercises its own power to affect the Federal gummint. The States have full control over how they seat their Electors, as opposed to being mandated by the central power.
Given the option, I would like to see the States as political entities be given more representation in the Fed gummint; perhaps repeal the 13th amendment and make the Senator representative of the State rather then the electorate.
February 14th, 2008
The ironic thing about the 2000 election is that the popular vote was closer (statistically) then the Florida vote. If we had a popular vote for the presidency, the recount lawsuits and hanging chads would have been a nationwide problem, instead of being confined to Florida.
Also, the electoral collage makes cheating in all but a few states useless. Imagine how easy it would be to slip a few thousand extra votes for McCain into an Arizona ballot box this fall, or some Obama/Clinton votes into an Illinois ballot box. That could be the difference in a 50/50 election. Both parties can put plenty of resources into keeping the other party honest if it’s confined to just the swing states, but how much of the Red state voting can Dem’s really watch when they don’t’ have much organization in those states (and vice versa).
February 14th, 2008
And if every election was as close as Florida’s in 2000, can you imagine the number of lawsuits that would occur if all that was needed was a few extra hundred votes. If Candidate A is popular in the big states than in the smaller ones, it would be easy to come up with a few hundred votes via lawsuit in the heavily urban areas to overcome the broad-based support of Candidate B in the so-called “flyover country”.
Can you imagine how complicated things would get if a Candidate sued in (what used to be) California to make up for losing the entirety of (what used to be) Wyoming?
After all, this is a Federal Republic made up of 46 States, 4 Commonwealths, and various Federal districts and Territories, not a single democracy.
February 14th, 2008
Mycroft,
Once again you’ve set me to thinking. One of the chief engineers of those factory installed systems which were designed to protect you and I from the government was James Madison. IIRC he never had a lot of faith in “The People” but rather a healthy mistrust of them and sought to protect the individual from the tyranny of the mob as well as government.
He and others made their arguments for a republican style government and the electoral system as mechanisms to moderate the excesses of the voting public in the Federalist Papers.
See also Federalist No. 68 on the Mode of Electing the President
Alex and Jimmy blogged under the handle Publius with a few guest posts from John Jay, I highly recommend picking up a copy of the transcripts. If I may be so bold, I think that this version would make a fine addition to any bookshelf as the appendices include The Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation and the Constitution of the U.S. along with the amendments.
February 15th, 2008
Mike Rossiter,
Uhm, care to elaborate on what it is specifically about the 13th amendment that you object to?
If it’s the one that starts out “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude…”, it’s kind of weird to just leave that hanging out there.
If it’s the one that starts out “If any citizen of the United States shall accept, claim, receive, or retain any title of nobility or honour…”, I’m not quite sure what’s got you so fretted.
Are you hopeful of receiving any presents, pensions, offices, or emoluments from from an emperor, king, prince, or foreign power?
If you have already received said and are fearful of having your citizenship revoked, I’m pretty sure that you can find someone signing their correspondence “Esq.” near you willing to argue against the legitimacy of its ratification.
February 15th, 2008
New Jersey has passed such a law. Can’t wait to see how they’ll piss and moan when the popular vote goes against their democratic wishes
February 19th, 2008
Deety,
Sorry, nothing as systemic as that, just a mental error. I meant the 17th, which provided for the selection of Senators by popular vote.
February 19th, 2008
No worries Mike, that’s what I figured. Just wanted to swipe “evidence” from any defenders of the nanny state about the “truly nefarious/flaky” motives of those of us who have more Federalist leanings, on the off chance that the occasional Mrs. Grundy swings by here.
You wouldn’t believe how popular the trope that being for states rights = a desire to revoke the civil rights of others really is in some quarters. Well, you probably would believe it. It’s just one of those products of various victims-studies departments in our academies that I find particularly maddening.