Posted on 07/19/2010 2:13:49 PM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
The state Legislature is poised to give final approval this week to a new law intended to bypass the Electoral College system and ensure that the winner of the presidential election is determined by the national popular vote.
Both the House and Senate have approved the National Popular Vote bill. Final enactment votes are needed in both chambers, however, before the bill goes to the governor's desk, the Globe reported last week.ss.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
No, it wasn’t.
Explain to me how the “national vote” is determined. And do so in a way that makes it clear that it involves no cooperation among the several states that are involved.
Well it was Mitt Romney. Republican? Debatable!
Based entirely upon a Constitutionally guaranteed right exclusive to the states.
I mistyped there - I meant to say it isn’t constitutional - without the “un” - couldn’t decide I guess whether to put “it is unconstitutional” or “it isn’t constitutional” and combined them to say the opposite of what I meant to say.
Article III–Manner of Appointing Presidential Electors in Member States
Prior to the time set by law for the meeting and voting by the presidential electors, the chief election official of each member state shall determine the number of votes for each presidential slate in each State of the United States and in the District of Columbia in which votes have been cast in a statewide popular election and shall add such votes together to produce a “national popular vote total” for each presidential slate.
The chief election official of each member state shall designate the presidential slate with the largest national popular vote total as the “national popular vote winner.”
The presidential elector certifying official of each member state shall certify the appointment in that official’s own state of the elector slate nominated in that state in association with the national popular vote winner.
At least six days before the day fixed by law for the meeting and voting by the presidential electors, each member state shall make a final determination of the number of popular votes cast in the state for each presidential slate and shall communicate an official statement of such determination within 24 hours to the chief election official of each other member state.
The chief election official of each member state shall treat as conclusive an official statement containing the number of popular votes in a state for each presidential slate made by the day established by federal law for making a state’s final determination conclusive as to the counting of electoral votes by Congress.
In event of a tie for the national popular vote winner, the presidential elector certifying official of each member state shall certify the appointment of the elector slate nominated in association with the presidential slate receiving the largest number of popular votes within that official’s own state.
If, for any reason, the number of presidential electors nominated in a member state in association with the national popular vote winner is less than or greater than that state’s number of electoral votes, the presidential candidate on the presidential slate that has been designated as the national popular vote winner shall have the power to nominate the presidential electors for that state and that state’s presidential elector certifying official shall certify the appointment of such nominees. The chief election official of each member state shall immediately release to the public all vote counts or statements of votes as they are determined or obtained.
This article shall govern the appointment of presidential electors in each member state in any year in which this agreement is, on July 20, in effect in states cumulatively possessing a majority of the electoral votes.
Uh huh.
And when a non-member state reports numbers that a member state doesn't agree with, what happens?
Don't just think about rainbows and kittens. Think about what can go wrong. It's part of how good decisions are made.
What happens in 2000 under this system, say, if Florida's count affects all of these "member" states?
Chaos all over, that's what.
What happens when a "member" state takes issue with the actions of a non-member, or another member?
Do all of the "member" states unify their voting procedures, etc.? Or do we have unequal treatment under the law?
Besides being a power grab, there are practical issues.
Limiting the effect of fraud and avoiding legal nightmares like 2000 are two of them.
It's just not a good ideas to dump all of the country's votes into one big bucket and then argue about how to count them.
And when a non-member state reports numbers that a member state doesn't agree with, what happens?
"The chief election official of each member state shall treat as conclusive an official statement containing the number of popular votes in a state for each presidential slate made by the day established by federal law for making a state’s final determination conclusive as to the counting of electoral votes by Congress."
They’re still not bypassing the electoral college system. States can choose whatever means they deem fit to choose their electors, but in the end Massachusetts still participates in the electoral college. It’s actually quite stupid on their part since they are allowing the rest of the nation instead of Massachusetts voters to choose their electors for them.
And how is that going to work out when an aggrieved small state adds extra votes to their total?
More importantly, What mechanism exists to stop it?
Is that really how you want to run an election? Where one state can give out any result it wants and the “member” states accept it as valid?
The Founding Fathers understood the propensity of men to do all kinds of things in order to gain and retain power. Do you?
There are no checks and balances here. It’s a bad idea.
Then we talk about fraud. When Philadelphia’s machine terrorizes voters and manufactures votes for the democrats, at least the damage is limited to the Commonwealth of PA. Under this proposed system, the incentive is for everyone to cheat as much as possible cause it will have effect nationwide.
That’s just dangerous!
Yes, it's Constitutional. Article II, Section 1:
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
If the Massachusetts is stupid enough to allow voters in the rest of the country to choose their electors for them, then by all means let them. That means in 2004, Massachusetts electors would have voted for Bush. In 1988, they would have voted for Bush Sr. over their homeboy Dukakis. And in 2012, they will be voting Republican, regardless of how Massachusetts voters decide.
"Resolution of all disputes relating to a presidential election must, under current federal law, be completed prior to the meeting of the Electoral College in mid-December, which is constitutionally required to be held on the same day in all 50 states."
You seem to have abandoned your baseless claim that it's unconstitutional for states to exercise their exclusive Constitutional right to set the criteria for the selection of electors, and resorted to meandering hypotheticals instead.
Here's one for you: Under the present system , what prevents a state from automatically awarding all of its elector positions to the Democrat Party slate?
And you still don’t want to discuss the real ramifications of the actions you defend.
I can concede that you have an argument about the Constitutionality. Honest people could decide either way which clause has supremacy.
Can you then switch to discussing practical matters?
You don’t seem to get the point that this is a bad idea. It is a power grab. No doubt. Liberals hate legitimate federal institutions, like the Senate and the Electoral College.
I would respect them if they attacked the problem head on, like men. But, instead they look for weasel ways.
Under the present system a state could certainly write legislation that awarded its electors automatically to one party of the other. Only the wrath of voters prevents that.
So we all agree to abide by elections. That’s what makes us America and not revolutionary France.
What agency makes the “national popular vote” real? What gives Ohio the power to question PA’s votes? Under your system, nothing! It’s chaos.
When Chicago cheats for its candidate, Texas will be forced to pre-cheat even harder for its. And when the whole thing blows up and we have no idea who will be president because of recriminations among the states of fraud, will you be here posting about what a great idea it is?
They will just change the law if that happens.
I've only defended state's rights against baseless charges of unconstitutionality.
As far as your hypothetical, I gave you an exact quote from the website.
Now can you man up and address the hypothetical I just posed?
Let's see:
Under the present system, what prevents a state from automatically awarding all of its elector positions to the Democrat Party slate?
I did noticed that so far only blue states have passed this.
The freezers and coolers would last only a little while.
Almost all commerce transits middle America. Food doesn’t grow on concrete. I suspect law and order would break down quickly when the big cities run out of supplies & food.
If war between the big cities and middle America ever started I’d bet big bucks on middle America. City folk are too lazy to fight for anything they can’t show off to their neighbors
The Founding Fathers only said in the U.S. Constitution about presidential elections (only after debating among 60 ballots for choosing a method): “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors . . .” The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly characterized the authority of the state legislatures over the manner of awarding their electoral votes as “plenary” and “exclusive.”
Neither of the two most important features of the current system of electing the President (namely, universal suffrage, and the 48 state-by-state winner-take-all rule) are in the U.S. Constitution. Neither was the choice of the Founders when they went back to their states to organize the nation’s first presidential election.
In 1789, in the nation’s first election, the people had no vote for President in most states, Only men who owned a substantial amount of property could vote.
In 1789 only three states used the state-by-state winner-take-all rule to award electoral votes.
There is no valid argument that the winner-take-all rule is entitled to any special deference based on history or the historical meaning of the words in the U.S. Constitution. The current 48 state-by-state winner-take-all rule (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in a particular state) is not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, the debates of the Constitutional Convention, or the Federalist Papers. The actions taken by the Founding Fathers make it clear that they never gave their imprimatur to the winner-take-all rule.
The constitutional wording does not encourage, discourage, require, or prohibit the use of any particular method for awarding the state’s electoral votes.
As a result of changes in state laws enacted since 1789, the people have the right to vote for presidential electors in 100% of the states, there are no property requirements for voting in any state, and the state-by-state winner-take-all rule is used by 48 of the 50 states.
A “republican” form of government means that the voters do not make laws themselves but, instead, delegate the job to periodically elected officials (Congressmen, Senators, and the President). The United States has a “republican” form of government regardless of whether popular votes for presidential electors are tallied at the state-level (as has been the case in 48 states) or at district-level (as has been the case in Maine and Nebraska) or at 50-state-level (as under the National Popular Vote bill).
When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
There have been 22,000 electoral votes cast since presidential elections became competitive (in 1796), and only 10 have been cast for someone other than the candidate nominated by the elector’s own political party. The electors are dedicated party activists of the winning party who meet briefly in mid-December to cast their totally predictable votes in accordance with their pre-announced pledges. Faithless electors are not a practical problem, and most states have complete authority to remedy any problem there could be, by means of state law.
If a Democratic presidential candidate receives the most votes, the state’s dedicated Democratic party activists who have been chosen as its slate of electors become the Electoral College voting block. If a Republican presidential candidate receives the most votes, the state’s dedicated Republican party activists who have been chosen as its slate of electors become the Electoral College voting block. The winner of the presidential election is the candidate who collects 270 votes from Electoral College voters from among the winning party’s dedicated activists.
Think again. 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 obscurely far down in name recognition as Arlington, TX) is only 19% of the population of the United States.
When presidential candidates campaign to win the electoral votes of closely divided battleground states, such as in Ohio and Florida, under the state-by-state winner-take-all rules, the big cities in those battleground states do not receive all the attention, much less control the outcome. Cleveland and Miami certainly did not receive all the attention or control the outcome in Ohio and Florida in 2000 and 2004.
Likewise, under a national popular vote, every vote everywhere will be equally important politically. There will be nothing special about a vote cast in a big city or big state. When every vote is equal, candidates of both parties will seek out voters in small, medium, and large towns throughout the states in order to win. A vote cast in a big city or state will be equal to a vote cast in a small state, town, or rural area.
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.
The current system of electing the president ensures that the candidates do not reach out to all of the states and their voters. Candidates have no reason to poll, visit, advertise, organize, campaign, or care about the voter concerns in the dozens of states where they are safely ahead or hopelessly behind. The reason for this is the state-by-state winner-take-all rule (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but now used by 48 states), under which all of a state’s electoral votes are awarded to the candidate who gets the most votes in each separate state.
Presidential candidates concentrate their attention on only a handful of closely divided “battleground” states and their voters. In 2008, candidates concentrated over two-thirds of their campaign events and ad money in just six states, and 98% in just 15 states (CO, FL, IN, IA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NH, NM, NC, OH, PA, VA, and WI). Massachusetts and 12 of the 13 smallest states were NOT included. Over half (57%) of the events were in just four states (Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania and Virginia). In 2004, candidates concentrated over two-thirds of their money and campaign visits in five states; over 80% in nine states; and over 99% of their money in 16 states, and candidates concentrated over two-thirds of their money and campaign visits in five states and over 99% of their money in 16 states.
Two-thirds of the states and people have been merely spectators to the presidential elections.
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