Obama-McCain contest: Should winner of popular vote always win the White House?
National Popular Vote initiative would change how states cast Electoral College votes.
By Gregory M. Lamb | Staff Writer for The Christian Science Monitor/ September 3, 2008 edition
Andy Nelson/Staff/FILE
Debate Continues: If presidential elections were decided by popular vote instead of the Electoral College, Al Gore would have won the White House in 2000 instead of George W. Bush. Activists want to change state laws so the popular vote prevails.
Reporter Greg Lamb discusses an innovative new way of thinking about the electoral college.
Reporter Greg Lamb
To John Koza’s way of thinking, the United States won’t be holding a true national election for president this November. And that’s made him eager to make a change: Revise the system to send the candidate with the most votes to the White House.
The problem is the Electoral College, which decides the election’s winner. Since electoral votes are tallied state by state, it turns out that the results from only about a quarter of the 50 states really matter. These so-called “battleground states” still have a chance to tilt toward one candidate or the other.
As a result, John McCain and Barack Obama will spend nearly all their time and money campaigning in these states. “Voters in three-quarters of the states [have been] ignored, meaning that the issues of concern to voters in three-quarters of the states [have been] ignored,” Mr. Koza says.
Making those neglected voters relevant is one of the chief reasons Koza founded the National Popular Vote initiative (nationalpopularvote.com) in 2006. But it’s not the only reason. Four times in US history – 1824, 1876, 1888, and 2000 – the candidate with the most popular votes did not win the White House because he had fewer votes in the Electoral College, which is based on the size of each state’s congressional delegation.
The National Popular Vote campaign encourages states to enact legislation that would give their electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes nationwide, thus ensuring that the candidate with the most popular votes always wins the election.
Efforts to change or abolish the Electoral College are hardly new. Some 800 proposed amendments to get rid of it have been introduced in Congress since the early 19th century, says Alex Keyssar, a professor of history and social policy at Harvard University. In the 1969-70, Congress nearly sent such legislation to President Nixon, who was ready to sign it; the amendment easily passed the House, but a filibuster by a handful of lawmakers in the Senate killed it.
Today, national and state polls consistently show about 70 percent of Americans favor direct election of the president.
The National Popular Vote drive differs in its tactics, though not its aims, from these previous efforts. Rather than a top-down strategy aimed at Congress, it seeks to enact change at the grass roots – state legislatures.
So far, four states – Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, and Maryland – with 50 combined electoral votes have enacted bills that would give their electoral votes to the winner of the nationwide popular vote. Similar legislation has passed one or both houses in more than a dozen other states.
Once states with at least 270 combined electoral votes (the minimum needed for electing a president) enact legislation, the change would go into effect, since the winner in the Electoral College would also have to have a popular vote majority.
Koza, a computer scientist who co-invented the rub-off instant lottery ticket used by state lotteries, is a consulting professor at Stanford University. But the drive to secure a national popular vote takes most of his time.
A Constitutional ‘end run’
Because his organization is not seeking a constitutional amendment, opponents have charged that the effort is trying to sneak through a loophole.
“It’s basically an end run around the Constitution,” says Michael Hough, a spokesman for the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a group of conservative state legislators that opposes the idea. “The appropriate way would be to actually amend the Constitution,” Mr. Hough says. “But they know that they can’t do that because they wouldn’t have the popular support, they wouldn’t be able to get it through [Congress].”
Scholars agree with Koza that the Constitution does give states power to decide how they choose to cast their electoral votes. Today’s winner-takes-all approach in each state was not mandated by the Founding Fathers, but evolved as a matter of political expediency in the mid-19th century. But Hough argues such an effort overrides important states’ rights. “It goes against the Founders’ intent,” he says.
“They came up with the Electoral College because they wanted states to have an important role in the elections.”
The Electoral College gives states with small populations a slightly bigger say than their number of potential voters, since every state starts with two electoral votes (just as every state has two senators). “By going to a national vote, you’re drastically changing the way we do elections in this country,” he says.
In 1979, Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D) of New York, considered one of the most erudite members of Congress at the time, called the idea of abolishing the Electoral College “the most radical transformation in our political system that has ever been considered.”
Close race anticipated
This fall’s election will give voters a fresh chance to see the current system – and, in Koza’s eyes, its flaws – in action. If the race is close, as is expected by many, the popular vote and Electoral College could once again yield different results.
Right now most of Koza’s support has come from Democrats, who still feel the sting from the 2000 election, in which Vice President Al Gore won the popular vote but lost the electoral vote – and the White House. But the opposite nearly happened the next time out in 2004. President Bush easily won the popular vote by 3.5 million, but Democratic candidate John Kerry was only a miniscule 60,000 votes away from carrying Ohio and winning the Electoral College.
Koza says people put too much focus on just the 2000 race, although he concedes most of his support is from Democrats. But “We have Republican sponsors [of the bill] in most states,” he says. Former Republican Sens. David Durenberger of Minnesota and Jake Garn of Utah sit on the group’s advisory board.
Koza’s group is “doing a smart thing in undertaking this at the state legislative level, where getting an item on the agenda is a little bit more down-to-earth process,” says Gregory Magarian, an election law expert and professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis.
He hopes that the national popular vote effort will stimulate a discussion about the way Americans hold their presidential elections and whether they’re satisfied with the current system. “It’s a real, deep, important question about what the results of a presidential election are supposed to reflect” – the view of the electoral college or of individual voters.
Time to ‘get rid of it’
Professor Keyssar, who wrote a letter endorsing the National Popular Vote bill to the Massachusetts legislature, agrees that the movement could spark a valuable discussion, though he suspects that the American public eventually would want to pass a constitutional amendment too.
“I think most legislators and most citizens really think that the Electoral College is kind of dumb and would like to get rid of it,” he says.
Though no previous effort to elect the president by popular vote has succeeded, Koza remains hopeful. “I compare it to Mothers Against Drunk Driving,” he says. “When they got started everyone laughed at their proposals…. Then they went state by state, and now almost all the states have enacted their platform at least to some degree.”
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Comments
2. kate | 09.03.08
Interesting article, but we’ve heard this argument before. What was missing here are the answers to obvious questions: What reasons do legislator give for being opposed to this? Exactly what benefit does the Electoral system provide in holding fair elections? I realize it is the way “things have always been done”, but does that mean we have to keep holding on to an antiquated system that essentially disenfranchises thousands (if not millions) of voters? No wonder we only get 30 percent voter participation. People dont believe their vote will count…. and they may be right.
3. Frank US | 09.03.08
Do John McCain or conservative republicans respect the moral foundations of this country? The U.S. Constitution was designed to protect the people of America from misguided government.
U.S. Constitution: Amendment I - Freedom of Religion
Right now, for the first time ever, your tax dollars are funding religious groups you may not agree with. To add insult to injury, conservative judges have ruled that you do not have a right to challenge this expenditure.
Amendment IV - Search and seizure
Under the guise of court action against abortion, Conservative republicans had John Ashcroft subpoena all the medical records of literally thousands of women just like you and members of your family. Conservative republicans are invading your privacy every day. Unfortunately for all of us, they don’t appear to care about our U.S. constitution, or by extension, the people of our great country.
Amendment X - Powers of the States and People
John McCain and conservative republicans have tried consistently to overturn States Laws. They used your tax dollars to destroy the will of the people of Oregon, and the famous “Death with Dignity” law; they lost, but undoubtedly will try again. Conservative republicans and John McCain do not respect States Rights.
Amendment VIII - Cruel and Unusual punishment
Would you rather die, or support a government which supported and sanctioned torture? The founding fathers would rather have died, and in fact they were proud to fight and die for our government: A government which specifically outlaws cruel and unusual punishment for very important reasons.
John McCain and the conservative republicans have destroyed the moral foundations of our country. I urge you to keep this in mind in the coming election as we rebuild our nation together by voting Democrat.
4. Maezeppa | 09.03.08
” If presidential elections were decided by popular vote instead of the Electoral College, Al Gore would have won the White House in 2000 ”
Al Gore DID win the White House in 2000! However, the Supreme Court saved the Florida Legislature from making good on its threat to change Florida’s electoral college votes to favor George Bush.
5. susan | 09.03.08
Evidence of the way a nationwide presidential campaign would be run comes from the way that national advertisers conduct nationwide sales campaigns. National advertisers seek out customers in small, medium, and large towns of every small, medium, and large state. National advertisers do not advertise only in big cities. Instead, they go after every single possible customer, regardless of where the customer is located. National advertisers do not write off Indiana or Illinois merely because a competitor has a 8% lead in sales in those states. And, a national advertiser with an 8%-edge over its competitor does not stop trying to make additional sales in Indiana or Illinois.
If the National Popular Vote bill were to become law, it would not change the need for candidates to build a winning coalition across demographics. Any candidate who yielded, for example, the 21% of Americans who live in rural areas in favor of a “big city” approach would not likely win the national popular vote. Candidates would still have to appeal to a broad range of demographics, and perhaps even more so, because the election wouldn’t be capable of coming down to just one demographic, such as voters in Ohio.
Although no one can predict exactly how a presidential campaign would be run if every vote were equal throughout the United States, it is clear that candidates could not ignore voters in any part of any state.
6. Anti-Social | 09.03.08
No system is perfect but this system functions as designed. It’s another one of those checks and balance things that this time around Democrats and Liberals hate. Next time it’ll be the Republicans turn to squawk about the EC.
“No wonder we only get 30 percent voter participation.” That stupid statement is a reflection on the quality of the candidates not the system used.
7. Ron Scheurer | 09.03.08
At least a popular vote, but the real problem is with simple majority rule. When was 50% ever a passing grade in school or college? If neither candidate can garner at least 70% of a two party system vote then neither should take office. Or if one does take office with less than a 70% popular vote, the voters should have a later option to vote that winner(?)out of office if they do not rise to the occasion. Many times in the last four years I’ve thought the country would be better off without a president or vice president, or even a secretary of state.
8. Th. Paine | 09.03.08
Justin Eames is right — the National Popular Vote effort merely takes the focus away from the “battleground” states and puts it on the most populous ones. So instead of the candidates spending all their time in Ohio, Michigan, Florida, and Pennsylvania, they will spend all their time in California, Texas, and New York. The Electoral College arguably limits the say of states that lean solidly one way or the other, but the NPV effort limits the say of the less populous states. Battleground states may change (Colorado, anyone?), but Wyoming will always have the smallest population.
As a side note, Al Gore failed to win his home state - Tennessee - in 2000. If he had won Tennessee, Floria would have been moot. Why should we elect a president who can’t even carry his home state?
9. Tom Walsh | 09.03.08
All John McCain needs to do is win any one of: Iowa, New Hampshire, or New Mexico, and he is president. He may only have 45% of the vote vs. Mr.Obamas 55%; but no matter. There is a slim chance that Mr. Obama may win No. Dakota; if so, New Hampshire won’t do for Mr. McCain. Even if Mr. McCain loses all of the above three states the election is a ‘tie’ and the supreme court, 5 to 4, can find some excuse to anoint Mr. McCain. Go John, four more ‘loose cannon’ lead years!
10. Popular Vote Good Idea | 09.03.08
If it was decided by popular vote then I would bother to vote. I live in California and my vote for president simply does not count under the electoral college.
11. JBBW | 09.03.08
Please support the change to a popular vote. I live in Texas and in the last two elections I felt my vote didn’t count because the members of the electorial college from Texas were going to support Bush. It’s not fair. I want my vote to actually make a difference. Everyone’s vote should be the same.
13. Molly | 09.03.08
“’No wonder we only get 30 percent voter participation.’ That stupid statement is a reflection on the quality of the candidates not the system used.” It seems to me our candidates are a reflection of us, not of the system. If we were asking for more and different quality information, keeping up with what was going on, and asking harder questions that get at the heart of the issues our nation faces wouldn’t we have better candidates? It seems to me that our tendency to want what’s best for us at this moment has gotten us into a lot of trouble rather than realizing that sacrifices in the short term and proactive decision making and planning ultimately benefits us, even if it’s more costly in the immediate future. I believe it’s a cop out to blame the quality of our candidates on the system as many of our government officials are excellent individuals truly vested in what’s best for this nation and the people in it. Are we really ready for better candidates? The ones that make us mad because they emphasize that we can’t have exactly what we want when we want it? I hope so!
14. Richard Winger | 09.03.08
It is wrong for anyone to say the National Popular Vote Plan is an “end run around the Constitution.” Article Two of the U.S. Constitution says states can choose presidential electors any way they wish. There is nothing intrinsically in contradiction to the Constitution, or the spirit of the Constitution, in the National Popular Vote Plan.
And it’s time to ease up on Al Gore for failing to carry his home state. Plenty of other 20th century presidential nominees didn’t carry their home state: William Howard Taft (1912), Theodore Roosevelt (1912), Woodrow Wilson (1916), James Cox (1920), John W. Davis (1924), Al Smith (1928), Herbert Hoover (1932), Alf Landon (1936), Thomas Dewey (1944), Adlai Stevenson (1952 and 1956), and George McGovern (1972).
15. Jared | 09.03.08
In response to Molly “One person, one vote. Anything else is undemocratic. Period.” The US is a representative republic- not a democracy. Even if the electoral college is eliminated we will still not be a democracy- we have representatives who enact laws rather than everything being put to a vote.
In response to Susan who compared an election to commercial sales- yes, companies want to sell to as many people as possible. The opposition doesn’t cease to exist as competitor after an arbitrary date. Once elected, a President has a complete monopoly on the executive branch, whether they obtained 50.1% market share or 75%. Yours is a wholly inadequate analogy.
16. Sara | 09.03.08
I strongly agree - our system is outdated. It should be one vote per citizen, and each vote should count - all the millions and millions of them.
Further, when in Washington, there should be one issue at a time voted on - no piggybacking, no bills with multi layers, one issue at a time.
And all our Washington employees should work year round just like we do. There is no reason they can not video conference and cast votes long distance on bills.
17. Jared | 09.03.08
Considering that a discordance between popular vote and EC has occurred only 4 times in 200+ years and only once in 120 years shows it isn’t terribly disconnected- yet. That could change as population centers continue to shift. The electoral college does result in some states appearing more important than others, but as suggested by Th. Paine they can change. Heavily populated states would gain an essential strangle-hold on national policy if the EC was eliminated.
18. CheeseMan | 09.03.08
There should be a none of the above checkmark on the ballots. So if you don’t want to vote for the 2 goons running you can vote none of the above, and if that wins the majority, 2 new goons have to run. Some countries already have this in place.
19. mightycpa | 09.03.08
Bad idea, in my opinion.
Thomas Jefferson (Democrat) warned about the tyranny of the majority. What will the D’s think when the people overwhelmingly elect a President who will abolish abortion, or oppose gay marriage, or support school choice?
Ben Franklin observed that the founders did not create a democracy, but rather a republic… and it would remain to be seen if we could keep it.
I think we lost that republic when the states lost their representation in Congress by the switch to direct election of Senators. If that had not happened, you can bet the idea of unfunded mandates wouldn’t have even gotten off the ground. The next thing you knew, we had an income tax, prohibition, a federal reserve and Social Security. Things started to suck big time.
I challenge all of you who support this dumb move to rise above the limitations of your public education, and read the writings of the very intelligent people who founded this country. Then take a look around at the democracies of the world, and see how they have to reorganize their governments, and how there are several political parties, and how basically they AREN’T the greatest country on earth.
20. Tom | 09.03.08
If this proposal will get them to move their campaign money, the constant ringing of phone calls, endless piles of letters, round the clock tasteless TV adds, and worse from my battleground state of Ohio to ANYWHERE else, I am in favor of it.
21. Adam | 09.03.08
“‘No wonder we only get 30 percent voter participation.’ That stupid statement is a reflection on the quality of the candidates not the system used.”
That, Anti Social, is bar-none the most idiotic comment I’ve heard on this comment board. A fourth-grader can see that voters in non-swing states are going to vote less because they know which way their state is going and nothing will change it. Half of my friends here in Illinois know the state is going for Obama no matter what happens, so they’re not voting. Of course, it may be wrong to choose not to vote like that, but if we’re talking about voter disenfranchisement, we have to talk about the electoral college. Personally, I’m on the fence about the issue, but the discussion should be happening, and obviously many aren’t voting because their state’s electoral votes are sewn up. People aren’t that dim. They know.
So if you’re going to call others stupid, when you yourself lack critical thinking skills, you should play with wooden blocks instead of computers, you infuriating person.
23. Richard Winger | 09.04.08
There is something worse than the tyranny of the majority, and that is the tyranny of the minority. To prevent any kind of tyranny, we have a Constitution that limits what the government can do.
But when someone takes the presidency who came in with fewer votes than someone else, that is tyranny of the minority.
24. LaughingWolf | 09.04.08
The 2000 election is a perfect example of why we HAVE the electoral college; collecting votes is a survey, not a perfect science. Within a very impressively small (but still significant!) margin of error, the votes are counted. There will always be votes missed, miss-counted, or falsely entered (most students of history know how notorious Ohio in particular has been for producing more votes than voting individuals). The reality is that people are imperfect, machines are imperfect, and mistakes will be made. The electoral college system lets us measure, and if necessary, recount, votes that are issued one state at a time. Florida was by NO MEANS the only state that had issues with its tallying in 2000, just the only one that mattered. Imagine if we had needed to recount the votes for every state that had counting errors that election as thoroughly as we tried to do in Florida. We’d still be counting!
Still want to get rid of the electoral college?
25. Don Mitchell | 09.04.08
The first comment, by Justin Eames, hits the nail on the head. Our constitution is designed to serve a large diverse nation with different regions and different needs. A Stanford professor should know that, and he probably does, but he sees an opportunity. Hope he enjoys his 15 minutes of fame.
26. ben barr | 09.04.08
the founding fathers knew that if the large states controlled it, it would be united, but controlled.
27. Think first | 09.04.08
Yeah popular vote….good idea. Shortsighted people…you should be ashamed to call yourselves Americans. Yeah it may not be perfect, but for God’s sake, look who will be heavily influencing votes. Example 1: Illegal Immigrants. They will vote for whoever will give them the biggest hand-out. (aka your liberal favorite Barack Obama) Example 2: Un-educated idealist kids fresh out of liberal college who have no idea what life out in the big world is really like. They’ll vote for who their college professors vote for because they’re being politically correct. Example 3: All the tree huggers will vote for a liberal because he’s trying to “protect the planet”…..protect the planet my ass, this planet will be here LONG after we’re gone and in all likelihood it will be laughing at us afterward. Bottom line, life is not politically correct nor does it serve individuals, the United States works because of the way it has worked so far. If you don’t like it and/or you can’t survive on your own, gtfo.
28. Charles | 09.04.08
THANK YOU! I have been advocating an amendment for years (but this end-around will do just fine). This is a letter I have written:
Constitutional Amendment on Electoral College
In the wake of the infamous 2000 Presidential election one would have assumed that by now we’d have amended the U.S. Constitution in order to scrap the Electoral College. Isn’t it about time we elected presidents based solely on the popular vote? I say it is. There are no valid reasons to continue this arcane, antiquated system – and plenty of reasons to abandon it.
Seven good reasons for a Constitutional Amendment:
1. FLORIDA! – That situation could hardly ever happen again if we counted the entire nation’s popular vote. A few hundred votes might matter in any given state, but spread over the whole country the margins would certainly be much greater than hundreds.
2. Voters would have one less reason to be cynical of politics and politicians.
3. Candidates would have to campaign in all states – not just big swing states.
4. Voters in small, non-swing states could be heard.
5. “Winner-take-all” is a patently unfair system of apportioning representation.
6. Without the College, third party candidacies would be more viable, and therefore much more influential.
7. We would not divide ourselves into either “blue” or “red” states. Instead, we would be one nation!
Think about it…
29. Larry | 09.04.08
A few things need to be done before the popular vote election of the president would be fair:
1) Make voting mandatory, at least in presidential elections. “None of the Above” should be an option, but every adult over the age of 18 should be required to show up at the polling place and cast their vote.
2) In order to win an election the candidate should be required to have at least 65 to 70% of the popular vote.
30. R Randolph | 09.04.08
Bad idea. The citizens of Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, and Maryland must ask themselves if their state government is representing them or people who don’t pay taxes there.
Please reread our constitution and understand that state rights were placed before federal rights which are clearly limited although ignored by our federal politicians and courts.
If this idea is so wonderful and if it is successful shouldn’t we also included eliminating several layers of then unnecessary government and taxing authority. Might I suggest only 2 levels of government, federal and 1 layer of local, if we’re going to continue destroying what’s left of state rights why not reorganize totally.
Yes, idea this might contribute to making us one nation, but would we still be a free nation. We’ve lost a lot of freedom from government control during the 20th century and a stronger central government will just continue to control more or more of our daily lives. But then I’m a libertarian with a strong belief in States Rights and limited government.
31. California Voter | 09.04.08
This issue came up before the California legislature a while back and failed. I was very disappointed. The only good thing about voting for president in California is that I didn’t have to vote for Kerry or Bush in 2004. Frankly, I don’t have very high opinions of either.
I don’t see this as a rural / city argument. Battleground states like Florida, Pennsylvania, and Ohio are very populous and have many large cities. The only reason they are so important now is because they might tilt either way. Delaware is a very small, densely populated state, and yet it’s so blue that neither side cares to court their voters. Colorado and New Mexico are rural battlegrounds, and thus have power. Idaho and Utah are red to the core, so they have none.
Frankly, I believe that if 80% of US voters are non-rural and 20% are rural, then the non-rural voters SHOULD have the majority of the power. By what right does a rural voter feel they should have more power than their headcount would justify?
And don’t get me started about the way we run presidential primaries in this country.
32. RJ | 09.04.08
The arguement that candidates would only visit large states holds no water. With the media as prevalent as it is, a visit to one state or another is covered across the country. The only difference in speeches is the background. I have yet to see a candidate I voted for in person and don’t feel it is necessary to see them to figure out what they stand for.
One person, one vote.
(Disenfranchised in a non-swing state)
33. Pithy Opiner | 09.04.08
Charles, re: #6, aren’t you afraid that with a “more viable” entry of third parties, we will resemble other countries where the president will be elected with only 33% of the vote, with the other 66% spread over 6 candidates??
34. Arlene Hobbs | 09.04.08
I pledge allegiance to the flag and to the REPUBLIC for which it stands!
Sophocles, warned us that throughout history when a REPUBLIC decays, it becomes a democracy.
The results of a democracy are Anarchy! The uneducated, masses who contribute nothing to their country except crime, children they can not support and immorality. They vote for more benefits to themselves such as free health care, free housing, food stamps, children with no means of support and increasing crime. Anarchy results!
35. w.d | 09.04.08
The “only” way I would agree to go to a popular vote, is if we have a national identification card that has a retina scan, and a thumb print and
picture on it.
that way we can be sure that every one’s vote is counted only “once”, and the
massive election fraud, which is currently being perpetrated by none other than the Democrats, will put an end to that.
for all of you who think that Al Gore won the popular vote, I can only say that he lost that election by much more than you think.
after the election, there were many States which reported that thousands of democrats voted twice, convicted criminals voted, even dead people voted.
THAT, AND THAT REASON ALONE IS WHY THE LEFT IS SO SCARED OF A “NATIONAL I.D. CARD” !
36. Curtly | 09.04.08
The electoral college was established in an era when information exchange was slow or nonexistant. One could not know who the candidates were, let alone what they stood for. A letter would take days if not weeks to get from one end of the country to the other. The best way then, was to elect trusted local people to journey to one location in the country (the electoral college), discuss the candidates with other representatives, then vote the wishes of their locale.
Today, we have near instant information exchange. Every person can know how much or how little they want to know re all candidates. We don’t need representatives to proffer our votes. I would like to have the right to vote directly for the candidate of my choice, rather than the popular candidate of my locale.
37. Bill | 09.04.08
The solution I have argued for for at least 20 years is that each legislative district in every state elects its electoal college member with two chosen statewide by the state’s popular vote. It would need no constitutuonal amendment. Let’s try it for a 100 years.
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38. Daryl | 09.05.08
It seems to me that the system should stay as it is, but with some tweaking. Many Americans do not spend much time with the issues as we would like to believe, nor do we stay informed on just how our government actually works. On one hand I like the electoral vote, as there is a part of me that thinks that if it were all ‘popular’ then maybe we would end up with the winner of American Idol as President. Burr…now that is a scary thought! There is a lot of ‘follow the leader’ as many people, caught up in the race, vote because they simply like the candidate. However, just how many of us stay tuned to the actual issues. So that being said, is it not prudent to have some controls in place?
I digress that I have not done my civic duty over the years, feeling that my vote did not count anyway. One day, not long ago, I was thinking about others countries and their systems. I saw how some of those people face death just trying to get to the polling place. Ashamed, I felt compelled to make my vote count…even if it does not.
The tweaking, as I referred to earlier, is that if the popular vote is in favor of a certain candidate, then maybe the Electoral College should reevaluate their votes, based on the people’s desires. If I was in office and I saw my fellow citizens were in favor of a certain candidate, I think that it would at least make me think about changing my electoral vote.
39. Curtly | 09.05.08
Check out Fairvote.org. This system allows voting for any of the several candidates and still assures the popular vote and a majority vote. Theres an article re this system, called IRV (instant runnoff vote) in the CSM archives of 9-28-07 “Let the Most Popular Candidate Win”. The system is used by the State of New Hampshire and the city of Cambridge MA, among others.
40. V. Fosterknew | 09.05.08
If Gore had won the 11 Electoral College votes from his “home state” of Tennessee, all of this would be irrelevant — but Tennessee was short on Gorons!
41. Nancy Heindl | 09.06.08
IT IS TIME FOR THE USA TO ELECT THEIR PRESIDENT BY THE POPULAR VOTE!!!!!!!!!!!! THE ELECTORAL VOTING IS ABSOLUTELY THE MOST ABSURD WAY OF ELECTING OUR PRESIDENT. WHEN WILL THE GOVERNMENT WAKE UP AND LISTEN TO THE PEOPLE OF THE USA??????
42. Ed Greening | 09.07.08
“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.”
This is copied from the Costitution. It directs each state to appoiont electors. Then sets out the number of electors and their qualifications for exclusion. The can select the NUMBER of electors in any way they choose. This does not allow them to direct the VOTE of the electors. Read it closely.
The Constitution is NOT an evolving document. When given the opportunity, it will work exactly as the founding fathers imagined, to protect the voice of ALL the people. Like no other document in history.
43. Don Howlett | 09.08.08
As with many elements of our constitution, the founding fathers spent much time thinking about the long-term effects of their decisions. Their decisions weren’t made with “sound-byte” thinking. The electoral college was set up to ensure that the president actually represented the entire country, not just a few highly populated areas. If the electoral college were eliminated, the candidates would spend all their time in Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York City. The candidates would only concern themselves with big-city issues, and would have mores and values reflective only of urbanites. The issues, concerns, and values of non-big-city urbanites would be completely and utterly ignored. The electoral college is part and parcel of the entire system of national government. We have a House of Representatives that is tied to population, a Senate that provides equal representation to all states, and an electoral college that ensures a “national” president, not a “regional” president. The electoral college system, in concert with the other aspects of national government, has served this nation well for more than two centuries. Keep it.
44. Dan | 09.08.08
People are talking about disenfranchised voters, but this won’t make people anymore likely to vote. Instead of the current battleground states we would just move the battlegrounds to the big cities. That doesn’t solve the problem at all. In fact we aren’t a democracy, our country is designed as a Republic. The majority shouldn’t rule the country. If you want to actually get more people to feel like their vote would count I think something like Instant Run-Off Voting (IRV) would go a lot further than messing with the electoral college. It allows for finding a candidate truly acceptable by the majority of voters, unlike the plurality voting we have now.
45. John | 09.09.08
All we ever hear from USA is the phrase “to ensure Freedom and Democracy”,
time to practice what your “Founding Fathers” claimed. Any President should be decided by the actual individual collective votes, utterly absurd that majority of US citizens voted for Gore yet Bush won !!! Nonsense.
47. Hotpprs | 09.13.08
It even goes beyond just the fact that the current campaigns can overlook certain areas during the election season. They can totally ignore certain areas of the country forever. Senators from small states will have less power in bargaining and getting money for their states, or social issues passed that their constituents believe in, because their would be no consequence in the next Presidential election if their states got screwed.
The planners of our country were very smart to develop a system of checks and balances to prevent authoritarian rule like they were used to in Europe.
If we go to a popular vote system, we might as well change the name of our country, because we really wouldn’t be “United States” anymore, just one big geographic blob ruled by populist rhetoric.
48. refriedtoad | 09.14.08
The posts in this forum show just how ignorant people are about the purposes for the electoral college and our system of voting. I might support the college representatives being eliminated, but not the underlying system of voting. The purpose of our voting system is to preserve federalism and states’ rights. If we eliminated the electoral college and instead went to a “pure” popular vote, we would remove some of the power of individual states, particularly small ones.
The needs of the citizens of New York would take complete precedence over those of Wyoming, for example, simply because there are more people there. New York already takes precedence over smaller states to a degree–it has more electoral votes than Wyoming. As it is, the voters in states like Wyoming and Montana get little attention from presidential candidates. Under a popular vote, they’d get none. Zero. Where’s the power of your “individual” vote if you live in such a place (I don’t), but elections for the executive branch are controlled by the 150 million people in California and the Northeastern states? Under a democratic vote, the majority of the midwest and south–except for Florida and Illinois–make the well-worn joke about “flyover country” reality.
To those of you who don’t think your vote is counted under the current system, it is. The vote of my state as a whole, though, is more important than my individual vote. We’re not all islands unto ourselves. We’re part of something bigger than that. If you’re just upset because your guy/gal doesn’t win, join the club. Mine don’t win either. But at least I know that every person in America, no matter where they live, has a significant voice in selecting their leader. gabrielshorn
Newbie
49. Just A Dreamer | 10.28.08
The truth is, people’s votes DON’T count. For instance, I’m a Texan, and a liberal. My democratic vote doesn’t mean anything, so why vote? There’s no incentive because Texas is ALWAYS a red state. Besides, most of the electoral college doesn’t even look at the votes that the voters made in their jurisdiction. There could be a democratic majority, and the electoral college representative will still vote republican, so what’s the point?
50. weavermount | 11.08.08
@refriedtoad, and the like
There seems to be people thinking things like
>The needs of the citizens of New York would take complete precedence over >those of Wyoming
You assume that you the population of Wyoming and New York are homogeneous populations that can be catered to as a whole. This isn’t the case. For example, a presidential candidate will come out for or against stim cell research. That will gain and cost them some number of votes in all states. There is no sucking up to New York, there is only sucking up to the majority of Americans. This is as good as you can do in practice for ideology. When it comes down where money is spent it will favor more dense urban populations. But I’m totally fine with that. Because it’s a better buy for the tax payer. Pumping money into cities means that more people can benifit from the same public work. A bumpy road that pisses off 100 million people a year SHOULD get fixed before one that only effects 10 million people. What this means at the end of the day is that votes will be bought as cheaply as possible. It will get politicians thinking about how to make the most number of people happy for the least amount of money, where ever they are.
51. weavermount | 11.08.08
Oh while a constitutional amendment would be diminishing states rights, how is pitching some to a state, and having it listen to you eroding states rights? The one thing you can always trust a government to do is act in it’s own perceived best interest.
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1. Justin Eames | 09.03.08
So you’re saying if you don’t live in New York, California, Florida, or Texas you should be completely inconsequential to the national vote for President. Under the electoral college system ‘battle ground’ states can change. If there were direct popular election there wouldn’t be any purpose in campaigning outside of the extremely densely populated states along the coast. No one would visit “America’s Heartland” or anywhere without a massive population. Rural issues would die within an election cycle or two. What direct popular election advocates is the disenfranchisement of more than half the population of the United States due to their inability to organize in the manner of those who live in cities. The polls which show a 70% approval for direct popular election prey on the ignorance of the issue commonplace in American society.