Posted on 04/16/2014 10:55:29 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
A plan, now stealthily making its way through state legislatures with astonishing speed, would junk the Electoral College and award the presidency to the winner of the popular vote.
The plan involves an Interstate Compact where states would commit to select electors pledged to vote for the national popular vote winner regardless of how their own state voted. When enough states pass this law -- sufficient to cast the Electoral College's majority 270 votes -- it will take effect.
The Electoral College will become a vestigial anachronism.
So far, nine states and the District of Columbia -- casting 136 electoral votes -- have joined moving half way to the 270 needed to put the compact into effect. The ratifying states are: Maryland, New Jersey, Illinois, Hawaii, Washington, Massachusetts, DC, Vermont, California, and Rhode Island.
Both houses in New York have passed it and its on Governor Cuomo’s desk.
And, it has already passed one house in: Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, and Oregon. These states, plus New York represent 107 votes. Combined with the others they are up to 242 votes . They need 270.
Who is pushing this?
All of those ratifying voted for Obama as did eight of the 10 one-house states.
The Movement is funded, in part, by the Center for Voting and Democracy, a George Soros-funded election group.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsmax.com ...
Since there is no formal consent process spelled out, could the Speaker of the House not just ask consent of an empty room and “deem it passed” by unanimous consent?
No - like I said, all the power would be concentrated in the cities. The two-party system goes far deeper than the electoral college, you would still have the same old system, without the small dispersal of power the electoral college gives us.
83% of the counties in the US are Republican.
The Constitution (in Article. II. Section. 1.) authorizes Texas to appoint presidential electors equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress.
Texas has 38 electoral votes.
Texas has 254 counties.
Go for it.
When was the last time you looked at an EC map? The large cities ALREADY control the votes in the states. What has that gotten us except RINOs and liberals?
But Montana and Utah and Wyoming etc. still hold their disproportional electoral votes - which is a small shift away from the big-city hammer, one that you want to deprive them of. It isn’t big, but it does put weight on the scales on the right side.
The number of EC votes in those states are so small as to be insignificant. Or do you want the two party system to have a lock on power in perpetuity?
You are assuming an outcome I don’t acknowledge. Eliminating the EC would not end the two-party system, and you take away some element of scale balancing, small as it is, from the equation. No sir! Don’t eliminate the last vestige of geographic equity left in the election law based on something (destroy the two party system) that isn’t going to happen.
The two party system does not exist because of the EC, so it is not logical to assume that destroying the EC will destroy the two party system.
256 counties in Texas... Harris has the most people (2.5 mil), Loving has the fewest (about 125)
Congressional consent is not required for the National Popular Vote compact under prevailing U.S. Supreme Court rulings. However, because there would undoubtedly be time-consuming litigation about this aspect of the compact, National Popular Vote is working to introduce a bill in Congress for congressional consent.
The U.S. Constitution provides:
“No state shall, without the consent of Congress,… enter into any agreement or compact with another state….”
Although this language may seem straight forward, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled, in 1893 and again in 1978, that the Compacts Clause can “not be read literally.” In deciding the 1978 case of U.S. Steel Corporation v. Multistate Tax Commission, the Court wrote:
“Read literally, the Compact Clause would require the States to obtain congressional approval before entering into any agreement among themselves, irrespective of form, subject, duration, or interest to the United States.
“The difficulties with such an interpretation were identified by Mr. Justice Field in his opinion for the Court in [the 1893 case] Virginia v. Tennessee. His conclusion [was] that the Clause could not be read literally [and this 1893 conclusion has been] approved in subsequent dicta.”
Specifically, the Court’s 1893 ruling in Virginia v. Tennessee stated:
“Looking at the clause in which the terms ‘compact’ or ‘agreement’ appear, it is evident that the prohibition is directed to the formation of any combination tending to the increase of political power in the states, which may encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States.”
The state power involved in the National Popular Vote compact is specified in Article II, Section 1, Clause 2 the U.S. Constitution:
“Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors….”
In the 1892 case of McPherson v. Blacker (146 U.S. 1), the Court wrote:
“The appointment and mode of appointment of electors belong exclusively to the states under the constitution of the United States”
The National Popular Vote compact would not “encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States” because there is simply no federal power — much less federal supremacy — in the area of awarding of electoral votes in the first place.
In the 1978 case of U.S. Steel Corporation v. Multistate Tax Commission, the compact at issue specified that it would come into force when seven or more states enacted it. The compact was silent as to the role of Congress. The compact was submitted to Congress for its consent. After encountering fierce political opposition from various business interests concerned about the more stringent tax audits anticipated under the compact, the compacting states proceeded with the implementation of the compact without congressional consent. U.S. Steel challenged the states’ action. In upholding the constitutionality of the implementation of the compact by the states without congressional consent, the U.S. Supreme Court applied the interpretation of the Compacts Clause from its 1893 holding in Virginia v. Tennessee, writing that:
“the test is whether the Compact enhances state power quaod [with regard to] the National Government.”
The Court also noted that the compact did not
“authorize the member states to exercise any powers they could not exercise in its absence.”
The National Popular Vote bill says: “Any member state may withdraw from this agreement, except that a withdrawal occurring six months or less before the end of a President’s term shall not become effective until a President or Vice President shall have been qualified to serve the next term.”
The electors are dedicated party activists of the winning party who meet briefly in mid-December to cast their totally predictable rubberstamped votes in accordance with their pre-announced pledges.
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 bloc. 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 bloc.
The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld state laws guaranteeing faithful voting by presidential electors (because the states have plenary power over presidential electors).
Any attempt by a state to pull out of the compact in violation of its terms would violate the Impairments Clause of the U.S. Constitution and would be void. Such an attempt would also violate existing federal law. Compliance would be enforced by Federal court action
The National Popular Vote compact is, first of all, a state law. It is a state law that would govern the manner of choosing presidential electors. A Secretary of State may not ignore or override the National Popular Vote law any more than he or she may ignore or override the winner-take-all method that is currently the law in 48 states.
There has never been a court decision allowing a state to withdraw from an interstate compact without following the procedure for withdrawal specified by the compact. Indeed, courts have consistently rebuffed the occasional (sometimes creative) attempts by states to evade their obligations under interstate compacts.
In 1976, the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland stated in Hellmuth and Associates v. Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority:
“When enacted, a compact constitutes not only law, but a contract which may not be amended, modified, or otherwise altered without the consent of all parties.”
In 1999, the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania stated in Aveline v. Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole:
“A compact takes precedence over the subsequent statutes of signatory states and, as such, a state may not unilaterally nullify, revoke, or amend one of its compacts if the compact does not so provide.”
In 1952, the U.S. Supreme Court very succinctly addressed the issue in Petty v. Tennessee-Missouri Bridge Commission:
“A compact is, after all, a contract.”
The important point is that an interstate compact is not a mere “handshake” agreement. If a state wants to rely on the goodwill and graciousness of other states to follow certain policies, it can simply enact its own state law and hope that other states decide to act in an identical manner. If a state wants a legally binding and enforceable mechanism by which it agrees to undertake certain specified actions only if other states agree to take other specified actions, it enters into an interstate compact.
Interstate compacts are supported by over two centuries of settled law guaranteeing enforceability. Interstate compacts exist because the states are sovereign. If there were no Compacts Clause in the U.S. Constitution, a state would have no way to enter into a legally binding contract with another state. The Compacts Clause, supported by the Impairments Clause, provides a way for a state to enter into a contract with other states and be assured of the enforceability of the obligations undertaken by its sister states. The enforceability of interstate compacts under the Impairments Clause is precisely the reason why sovereign states enter into interstate compacts. Without the Compacts Clause and the Impairments Clause, any contractual agreement among the states would be, in fact, no more than a handshake.
Under the current system, the “flyover” states are politically irrelevant. That’s what “flyover” means.
The indefensible reality is that more than 99% of campaign attention was showered on voters in just ten states in 2012- and that in today’s political climate, the swing states have become increasingly fewer and fixed.
80% of the states and voters are ignored because of current state winner-take-all laws (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but later enacted by 48 states). They ensure that the candidates, after the conventions, will not reach out to about 80% 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.
Presidential candidates concentrate their attention on only a handful of closely divided “battleground” states and their voters. There is no incentive for them to bother to care about the majority of states where they are hopelessly behind or safely ahead to win.
10 of the original 13 states are ignored now.
Four out of five Americans were ignored in the 2012 presidential election. After being nominated, Obama visited just eight closely divided battleground states, and Romney visited only 10. These 10 states accounted for 98% of the $940 million spent on campaign advertising. They decided the election.
None of the 10 most rural states mattered, as usual.
About 80% of the country was ignored —including 24 of the 27 lowest population and medium-small states, and 13 medium and big states like CA, GA, NY, and TX.
80% of the states and people have been merely spectators to presidential elections. We have no influence. That’s more than 85 million voters, more than 200 million Americans, ignored. When and where voters are ignored, then so are the issues they care about most.
The number and population of battleground states is shrinking.
Policies important to the citizens of non-battleground states are not as highly prioritized as policies important to ‘battleground’ states when it comes to governing.
In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided).
Support for a national popular vote is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in virtually every state surveyed in recent polls
in recent or past closely divided Battleground states: CO – 68%, FL – 78%, IA —75%, MI – 73%, MO – 70%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM– 76%, NC – 74%, OH – 70%, PA – 78%, VA – 74%, and WI – 71%;
in Small states (3 to 5 electoral votes): AK – 70%, DC – 76%, DE – 75%, ID – 77%, ME – 77%, MT – 72%, NE 74%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM – 76%, OK – 81%, RI – 74%, SD – 71%, UT – 70%, VT – 75%, WV – 81%, and WY – 69%;
in Southern and Border states: AR – 80%, KY- 80%, MS – 77%, MO – 70%, NC – 74%, OK – 81%, SC – 71%, TN – 83%, VA – 74%, and WV – 81%; and
in other states polled: AZ – 67%, CA – 70%, CT – 74%, MA – 73%, MN – 75%, NY – 79%, OR – 76%, and WA – 77%.
Americans believe that the candidate who receives the most votes should win.
The bill has passed 33 state legislative chambers in 22 rural, small, medium, and large states with 250 electoral votes. The bill has been enacted by 11 jurisdictions with 165 electoral votes – 61% of the 270 necessary to go into effect.
NationalPopularVote
National Popular Vote does not go into effect until enacted by states with 270 Electoral College votes.
In the meantime, states will continue to award electors under their current laws. And at least 80% of states and voters will continue to be politically irrelevant in presidential elections.
The Electoral College is the 538 dedicated party activists elected by us by states from among party slates.
National Popular Vote preserves the Electoral College.
The Electoral College will still choose the President.
The candidate receiving the most popular votes from all 50 states (and DC) would get all the 270+ Electoral College votes of the enacting states.
Now 24 of the 27 smallest states are irrelevant.
40 states were politically irrelevant in 2012.
Only the 10 closely divided states mattered in 2012.
With National Popular Vote, big cities would not get all of candidates’ attention, much less control the outcome.
16% of Americans live in rural areas. None of the 10 most rural states matter now.
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 far down as Arlington, TX) is only 15% of the population of the United States.
Suburbs and exurbs often vote Republican.
If big cities controlled the outcome of elections, the governors and U.S. Senators would be Democratic in virtually every state with a significant city.
A nationwide presidential campaign, with every voter equal, would be run the way presidential candidates campaign to win the electoral votes of closely divided battleground states, such as Ohio and Florida, under the state-by-state winner-take-all methods. The big cities in those battleground states do not receive all the attention, much less control the outcome. Cleveland and Miami do not receive all the attention or control the outcome in Ohio and Florida. In the 4 states that accounted for over two-thirds of all general-election activity in the 2012 presidential election, rural areas, suburbs, exurbs, and cities all received attention—roughly in proportion to their population.
The itineraries of presidential candidates in battleground states (and their allocation of other campaign resources in battleground states) reflect the political reality that every gubernatorial or senatorial candidate knows. When and where every voter is equal, a campaign must be run everywhere.
With National Popular Vote, when every voter is equal, everywhere, it makes sense for presidential candidates to try and elevate their votes where they are and aren’t so well liked. But, under the state-by-state winner-take-all laws, it makes no sense for a Democrat to try and do that in Vermont or Wyoming, or for a Republican to try it in Wyoming or Vermont.
Even in California state-wide elections, candidates for governor or U.S. Senate don’t campaign just in Los Angeles and San Francisco, and those places don’t control the outcome (otherwise California wouldn’t have recently had Republican governors Reagan, Dukemejian, Wilson, and Schwarzenegger). A vote in rural Alpine county is just an important as a vote in Los Angeles. If Los Angeles cannot control statewide elections in California, it can hardly control a nationwide election.
In fact, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland together cannot control a statewide election in California.
Similarly, Republicans dominate Texas politics without carrying big cities such as Dallas and Houston.
There are numerous other examples of Republicans who won races for governor and U.S. Senator in other states that have big cities (e.g., New York, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts) without ever carrying the big cities of their respective states.
With a national popular vote, every voter everywhere will be equally important politically. There will be nothing special about a vote cast in a big city or big state. When every voter 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.
Candidates would 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 waitress mom voters in Ohio.
Did you copy and paste that from the liberal school of logic? Maybe just their talking points?
There is a reason the founders established the electoral college. They weren’t idiots.
National Popular Vote does not end the Electoral College.
The 538 dedicated party activists of the winning party will continue to meet briefly in mid-December to cast their totally predictable rubberstamped votes in accordance with their pre-announced pledges to elect the President.
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