Posted on 07/17/2011 11:24:59 AM PDT by thecodont
It's a complaint that arises every four years, then quickly fades: the disproportionate power a small number of states have over the presidential contest.
California lawmakers want to do something about it - in fact, they've tried for years, but were blocked by former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. So just as they did in 2006 and 2008, legislators this week approved a proposal to make California relevant.
Here's how it works: California's electoral votes are awarded in a winner-take-all manner. If a presidential candidate wins the majority of popular votes in California, he or she gets all the state's 55 electoral votes. This legislation, already adopted in eight other states, would award the electoral votes of participating states to the candidate who wins the nation's popular vote.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/07/15/BAST1KAHH6.DTL#ixzz1SO4vkHdA
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
That’s a pity. You might learn by reading.
I won’t learn anything from you anyway. Somehow, you’ll have to learn to live with that.
Popular vote troll has returned.
See my post #11 ...
Like the North Vietnamese cadre.
Strict repetition as a means of learning only what the state wants you to learn.
Do you dispute the posting’s logic?
Are you claiming repetition negates the value of what I post?
I am prepared with thoughtful reasoned responses because I continually come across the same repeated misinformation, myths, and unthinking responses.
(I looked up “River Raisin” too. Fascinating read!)
You are missing the Constitutional point. Once a state decides to select their electors by popular election, their vote MUST be equally weighed within the contex of that S T A T E election (there is NO Federal election for POTUS or any other Federal Office).
If 51% of a states' voters vote for the electors of candidate x, but the state then awards the electoral count to candidate y because candidate y won more votes in OTHER states...those 51% of voters would then be disenfranchised as their vote would not count equally in comparison to other voters in their own state. And their own state is the FULL, COMPLETE jurisdiction of the election. The only jurisdiction of said election.
I’m calling you the lying liberal troll you are.
I'm claiming that your being a multiple-forum troll does.
History is good learin.
I’m thinking maybe we should spread the word at the other sites he posts on.
I would but I don’t post on those other websites. I’d be (properly) called out as a nOOb if I signed up to do that.
Same here. Its a drawback of the honesty you find among FReepers.
We don’t post from a script on hundreds of different sites. Having to do that seems to indicate a weakness of an idea.
I was born in Albion. Dr Keefer sobered up enough to deliver me.
I worked at the radio station in “Little Africa” for a few years back in the ‘70’s.
My ex wife worked for a Dr in Albion for a while. The Doc and her husband were both Real Africans but good people. I think the name was Alapui.
We went to the Clock with them a few times.
That's what this movement is about across the various states and nothing else.
INSTEAD OF CHERRYPICKING FROM THE DECISION, PLEASE POST THE ENTIRE QUOTE:
"The individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote for electors for the President of the United States unless and until the state legislature chooses a statewide election as the means to implement its power to appoint members of the Electoral College. U.S. Const., Art. II, §1. This is the source for the statement in McPherson v. Blacker, 146 U.S. 1, 35 (1892), that the State legislature’s power to select the manner for appointing electors is plenary; it may, if it so chooses, select the electors itself, which indeed was the manner used by State legislatures in several States for many years after the Framing of our Constitution. Id., at 28—33. History has now favored the voter, and in each of the several States the citizens themselves vote for Presidential electors. When the state legislature vests the right to vote for President in its people, the right to vote as the legislature has prescribed is fundamental; and one source of its fundamental nature lies in the equal weight accorded to each vote and the equal dignity owed to each voter. The State, of course, after granting the franchise in the special context of Article II, can take back the power to appoint electors. See id., at 35 (“[T]here is no doubt of the right of the legislature to resume the power at any time, for it can neither be taken away nor abdicated”) (quoting S. Rep. No. 395, 43d Cong., 1st Sess.)."
"The right to vote is protected in more than the initial allocation of the franchise. Equal protection applies as well to the manner of its exercise. Having once granted the right to vote on equal terms, the State may not, by later arbitrary and disparate treatment, value one person's vote over that of another. See, e.g., Harper v. Virginia Bd. of Elections, 383 U.S. 663, 665 (1966) (“[O]nce the franchise is granted to the electorate, lines may not be drawn which are inconsistent with the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment”). It must be remembered that “the right of suffrage can be denied by a debasement or dilution of the weight of a citizen’s vote just as effectively as by wholly prohibiting the free exercise of the franchise.” Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 555 (1964)."
Now that we have the FULL quote, what does the NPV law ACTUALLY mean ???
Basically, this:
The State grants the individual voter a franchise to vote for the candidate of his or her choice and the winner of the State popular vote will receive its electoral votes. EXCEPT that if the national popular vote goes to the OTHER candidate, the State will value the votes of ALL OTHER voters in the OTHER 49 States [plus the voters of THIS State that voted for the OTHER candidate]. In this case, the State will DISENFRANCHISE the majority of voters within the State and AWARD THE ELECTORAL VOTES TO THE OTHER CANDIDATE.
Seems that the effect of valuing OTHER voters' votes over mine flies in the face of the Equal Protection issues cited in the decision ...
Also it is an open question as to whether the NPV law violates Article I, Section 10:
"No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay."
If the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is considered a “political compact” under the Compact Clause, then the Constitution requires congressional consent, and the compact would need to receive federal approval. The power to appoint electors is exclusively granted to the states, but that power is still subject to other provisions of the Constitution. Accordingly, the court must analyze the appointment of electors under other provisions of the Constitution, including the Compact Clause (McPherson v. Blacker, 146 U. S. 1 (1892)).
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