Reapportionment and the Electoral College

RealClearPolitics ^ | December 21, 2010 | Sean Trende

[neverdem]

The U.S. Census Bureau today announced its long-awaited final population and reapportionment numbers. The official population of the U.S. as of April 1, 2010 was 308,745,538, up from 281,421,906 in 2000. The Northeast grew 3.2 percent, the Midwest grew 3.9 percent, the South grew 14.3 percent and the West grew by 13.8 percent. Overall, it was the slowest growth in the country since the 1930s.

The apportionment winners were: Texas (4 seats), Florida (2 seats), Arizona (1 seat), Georgia (1 seat), Nevada (1 seat), South Carolina (1 seat), Utah (1 seat), Washington (1 seat). The losers were: New York (2 seats), Ohio (2 seats), Illinois (1 seat), Iowa (1 seat), Louisiana (1 seat), Massachusetts (1 seat), Michigan (1 seat), Missouri (1 seat), New Jersey (1 seat), Pennsylvania (1 seat)...

[okie01]

By state (electoral college votes), by political affiliation, support for a national popular vote in recent polls has been:

Bogus polls. Fifty states with 65-85% of every segment in favor of the National Popular Vote. That's a "placebo" result.

I'd wager the NPV was the only issue question in the poll.

If they had asked, as the only question, whether the voters favored our current way of electing Presidents -- the electoral College -- they'd have gotten the same results.

Sorry. Not buying.

[mvymvy]

June 7, 2010 — The New York Senate passed the National Popular Vote bill (S2286A / A1580B), with over two-thirds of both political parties supporting the bill in a 52-7 roll call. The vote was 22-5 among Senate Republicans (with 3 not voting) and 30-2 among Senate Democrats. The bill now goes to the 150-member Assembly where it has 80 sponsors.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks neverdem.

[Political Junkie Too]

I have a very hard time accepting California did not lose a rep (due to the mass exodus out of the state) and that North Carolina did not get one rep. That seems extremely fishy to me.

I guess it's a relative thing. If all the states grew to some degree, then just keeping pace means keeping the seats that you have. If you grew above the average, you gained seats, and if you were below the average you gave up seats.

-PJ

[grellis]

If you would like to be added or dropped from the Michigan ping list, please freepmail me.

[lacrew]

“Again, do the math, I have.

States with few electoral votes tend to be conservative and the split tend to favor republicans.”

I’d hate to have to wade through it...but again intuitively, we know the GOP is over-represented in low population states. States like Utah, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Montana that get the baseline minimum of votes. If any of these states split their electoral votes, the Democrats will start getting a piece of that over-representative pie. Mathmatically, this has to hurt the GOP.

[thackney]

One more time, do the math, or look at what I’ve already done.

1996 Presidential General Election Data - National
http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/data.php?year=1996&datatype=national&def=1&f=0&off=0&elect=0

Existing System electoral votes:
Clinton 379
Dole 159
Perot 0

Each state keep their electoral votes but split them within the state by their respective voting:
Clinton 266
Dole 224
Perot 46

- - - - - -

2000 Presidential General Election Data - National

Existing System electoral votes:
Gore 266
Bush 271
Nader 0

Each state keep their electoral votes but split them within the state by their respective voting:
Gore 258
Bush 263
Nader 7

- - - - - -

2004 Presidential General Election Data - National

Existing System electoral votes:
Bush 286
Kerry 251

Each state keep their electoral votes but split them within the state by their respective voting:
Bush 279
Kerry 258

- - - - - -

2008 Presidential General Election Data - National

Existing System electoral votes:
Obama 365
McCain 173

Each state keep their electoral votes but split them within the state by their respective voting:
Obama 289
McCain 249

- - - - - -

Over the last 4 election cycles:
Republicans gain 185 votes,
Democrats lose 121 votes,
Third Party goes from zero to 53 votes.

[thackney]

One more time, do the math, don’t theorize.

Or look at what I’ve already done, past election results are easily available.

1996 Presidential General Election Data - National
http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/data.php?year=1996&datatype=national&def=1&f=0&off=0&elect=0

Existing System electoral votes:
Clinton 379
Dole 159
Perot 0

Each state keep their electoral votes but split them within the state by their respective voting:
Clinton 266
Dole 224
Perot 46

- - - - - -

2000 Presidential General Election Data - National

Existing System electoral votes:
Gore 266
Bush 271
Nader 0

Each state keep their electoral votes but split them within the state by their respective voting:
Gore 258
Bush 263
Nader 7

- - - - - -

2004 Presidential General Election Data - National

Existing System electoral votes:
Bush 286
Kerry 251

Each state keep their electoral votes but split them within the state by their respective voting:
Bush 279
Kerry 258

- - - - - -

2008 Presidential General Election Data - National

Existing System electoral votes:
Obama 365
McCain 173

Each state keep their electoral votes but split them within the state by their respective voting:
Obama 289
McCain 249

- - - - - -

Over the last 4 election cycles:
Republicans gain 185 votes,
Democrats lose 121 votes,
Third Party goes from zero to 53 votes.

[mvymvy]

This is the math.

In the 2008 presidential election, the 25 lowest population states (with 3 to 7 electoral votes) were evenly split with 57 democratic electoral votes and 58 republican electoral votes.

[WinOne4TheGipper]

Every one is allowed 2.5 kids. Hope you get the top half.:)

[thackney]

Do you not agree, in most elections republicans would benefit from this split?

Which is why it will never happen.

[lacrew]

I got Bush - 267, Gore - 266, Nader - 5...a lot depends on how you handle rounding...and who gets awarded the ‘leftover’ fractions of electoral votes from no name candidates.

So, I was wrong in that Bush would have lost, but right in intuitively knowing that his electoral votes would go down.

The only thing that saves Bush, however, is the presence of Nader. Under this scenario, he peels 4 votes from Gore and 1 from Bush. If Nader weren’t there, the count would be Bush 268, Gore 270. Similar arguments could be made that Nader’s presence helped under the current system with Florida. However, I don’t see any advantage possible to GOP...and only pitfalls.

Remember, the college favors small states, who undeservedly get 3 votes, even with miniscule populations. Most of these states give this unfair advantage to GOP candidates. The system you propose will let Democrats get a piece of that pie.

There is also the whole notion that we are a union of states. States vote on who the president is, not the people. I know this has been complicated by amendment; but, looking at the original intent of the constitution, splitting the electoral college based on popular vote was not in the cards.

Bush Gore Nader
AL 5 4
AK 2 1
AZ 4 4
AR 3 3
CA 23 29 2
CO 4 4
CT 3 5
DE 1 2
DC 0 3
FL 13 12
GA 7 6
HI 2 2
ID 3 1
IL 10 12
IN 7 5
IA 3 4
KS 4 2
KY 5 3
LA 5 4
ME 2 2
MD 4 6
MA 4 7 1
MI 9 9
MN 5 5
MS 4 3
MO 6 5
MT 2 1
NE 3 2
NV 2 2
NH 2 2
NJ 6 9
NM 2 3
NY 12 20 1
NC 8 6
ND 2 1
OH 11 10
OK 5 3
OR 3 4
PA 11 12
RI 1 3
SC 5 3
SD 2 1
TN 6 5
TX 19 12 1
UT 4 1
VT 1 2
VA 7 6
WA 5 6
WV 3 2
WI 5 6
WY 2 1
Total:
267 266 5

[The Comedian]

The really, really depressing thing about that election is that Al Gore lost by 1 vote. Dear heavens.

We either need to radically pare down suffrage so that, say, only landowners can vote, or we need a plague that culls all of the double-digit IQs in this country.

We can't survive being 50% mentally necrotic.

Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.

[thackney]

a lot depends on how you handle rounding

- - - - -

I see that know and where I came up short on Electoral Votes. I should have built in a better check.

I would first apply normal math rounding, number of electoral votes available times percentages.
3.500000000 equals 4
3.499999999 equals 3.

When the sum of these are off, (like mine were) the largest fractional rounding is removed. i.e. if the rounding results in one vote short and Candidate “A” had the largest partial electoral votes in the math:
e.g.
“A” 3.4
“B” 2.3
“C” 0.3

“A” gets the remaining vote. Reversed when round up results in one too many votes.

With that in mind I got similar but different results:
Gore = 263
Bush = 264
Nader = 10

This is getting more complicated with more than two significant candiates. It would make the selling of it harder.

[thackney]

With my spreadsheet corrected, it is fairly easy to drop in the data and look at each election.

The results going back in time over 50 years is the same results but closer races. Until I reached 1960.

If those same unpledged electors still voted for Harry Byrd as they did, Nixon wins and Kennedy would lose.

But they might not have made their symbolic votes.

I think it would spread out more campaigning efforts without the winner take all schemes. But I have no illusions it would ever happen.

[Cacique]

btt

[Still Thinking]

Wow, after the mass exodus that’s gone on over the past decade, it’s shocking (and disappointing) to see Kalifornia not losing big.

[Still Thinking]

I’d hate to have to wade through it...but again intuitively, we know the GOP is over-represented in low population states. States like Utah, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Montana that get the baseline minimum of votes. If any of these states split their electoral votes, the Democrats will start getting a piece of that over-representative pie. Mathmatically, this has to hurt the GOP.

Not necessarily. In exchange for parts of Wyoming and Montana, the GOP gets a share of California and New Yawk, which have far more electors.

[Still Thinking]

It’s selfish to have too many kids! It’s selfish not to have enough! Egads, is there a right number, somewhere in the middle, that unselfish people have?

Yeah. I think it's 2.3 Two kids is selfish, as is three, but if ya got 2.3, you're good!

[Still Thinking]

That will last until the first time that a Republican wins the national popular vote. Then we will be able to watch them squirm to find reasons that they can't do that.

In 2000, the Gore camp foresaw the likelyhood of a popular/electoral vote split, and busily reminded everyone that it was the EC vote that counted. Payback's a beyotch.