Virginia House passes bill to award electoral votes to whoever wins the popular vote

The Hill ^ | 02 12 2020 | Aris Folley

[ptsal]

Does that mean a Trump wave in Virginia would be reversed by bowing to the blue wave of New York and California.

Why would anyone live in Virginia?

[Svartalfiar]

Bypassing the will of the voters in your state is denying them the guaranteed Republican form of government whereby one elects someone else to represent their wishes. If you want to argue that the Constitution says that the states themselves elect the President and Vice President, then that argument loses standing after over 200 years of precedent showing that this has been given to the citizens to decide. The USSC would weigh in on the side of the citizens as they really would have no choice.

Except how they choose electors for FedGov has nothing to do with the State government being a Republican form. That is simply how the State itself is set up and functions, it has nothing to do with Federal elections.

But, if we read our Constitutions, we see that there is no requirement for the State Legislatures to even have a popular election, at all:

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

What part of that requires a popular election? Sure, historically, we have always voted for our electors (indirectly by voting for a particular candidate), but that doesn't mean a State can't do something different. Precedent is one of the stupidest things the judiciary ever came up with. The only time it should ever be used is if a clear reading of the relevant Constitutional text / applicable law doesn't give an easy answer, then precedent can give some rationale for how previous cases were decided. BUT, in no case is precedent binding, unless you have a legal issue with the exact same questions/situation as a previous one, within the same jurisdiction as the precedent being referenced.

[Uncle Sham]

" What part of that requires a popular election? Sure, historically, we have always voted for our electors (indirectly by voting for a particular candidate), but that doesn't mean a State can't do something different"

I'll ask you as I did to another poster on this subject. Does a state that has a popular election take place for the office of President have the ability to ignore the results of that election? Also, do you really think that the Supreme Court would find constitutional a process that denies the voters their vote after over 200 years of precedent?

[Svartalfiar]

I'll ask you as I did to another poster on this subject. Does a state that has a popular election take place for the office of President have the ability to ignore the results of that election?

Yes and no. The State can't change the process if they don't like the results, the process is already done. The method for choosing said electors was already in place. But if they change it before the election, sure.
Also, what do you consider a faithless elector? They ignore the results of the popular election, yet none of them have ever been punished in any way except for maybe banned from their party, but that has nothing to do with the State legislatures.


Also, do you really think that the Supreme Court would find constitutional a process that denies the voters their vote after over 200 years of precedent?

Why not? There are TONS of things that States/FedGov do that change things (homosexual 'marriage', abortion, Patriot Act/FISA, ponds being navigable waterways, gov unions, Deptof-ABCDEFGHIJKL...) that have been one way (or non-existent) for a long time, yet the Supreme Court hasn't gone against them. Hell, in some of them, the SC were the ones making the changes!

They should be considering any case ONLY on the Constitutional merit. NOTHING ELSE. Like I said in my other post, precedent should mean almost nothing in a legal sense.

[Svartalfiar]

The constitution sets out that the state gets so many electoral votes proportional to its population and that the people vote for those electors.

The state can determine how those electoral votes are allocated pursuant to the voting of its populace. Either winner take all or, more recently, proportional electors based on, again, the populace’ vote. (I’m not sure if the proportional vote has been tried in court yet) Either way the electors are still directly picked by the populace - NOT the state government.

And where in the Constitution does it say that? My copy says nothing about the populace picking the electors, all it says is that electors are selected in a manner chosen by the Legislature of the State. Whether that's a vote by the population, by the State senators, a cagefight between the top state reps from each party, or they just always split 50-50, whatever they can get passed. And FYI, the Gov has no veto.

[Svartalfiar]

Speaking of which - I would actually change the 3 electoral votes that DC has alone and make those three votes collectively be for all non-state US territories combined.

Really, who in DC should be voting? DC is the seat of government - it shouldn't have any residents. All the Congresscritters and their staffs, all the Executive and the Judiciary, and their staffs, all of these people should have residences in their home States. Not one of them should actually live in DC. Every single other person - custodial, restaurant staff, security, hookers, drug dealers, gas station guy, lobbyists, CIA moles, lawn mowers, and so on, should all be commuting in from mainly VA and MD. DC shouldn't have a 'city council', that's Congress's job, and they should have a couple guys in charge of departments of lawn beautification, monument upkeep, roads, water/sewers, etc. Every single residential quarters (except for a couple hotels) needs to be either razed, or ceded back to MD. DC should have a population of almost 0 - The First/Second Families are the only ones I can think of that should have an official residence of DC.

[Uncle Sham]

"Also, what do you consider a faithless elector? They ignore the results of the popular election"

Faithless electors are outlawed in twenty nine states and dealt with in other means by the twenty one states who haven't yet addressed the issue. The Supreme Court has ruled on both sides of the issue in that states can legally compel electors to honor the results of the election within a state and that faithless electors have the freedom to cast their vote however they choose. Basically, the Supreme Court has ruled this to be a "state" issue and in our entire history as a nation only one election was ever decided by the faithless elector vote when in 1796, Charles Pinckney did not get the votes he earned as they abstained from listing him. This resulted in John Adams being our second President instead of Pinckney. Once again, due to precedent, which is extremely important in an issue like this where the individual right to vote is being affected, the faithless elector, as a common practice, would be ruled unconstitutional as being destructive to the individual voter's faith in the system itself. Why have elections if the voter's expressed wishes are ignored? That it has happened now and then does not pave the way to make it a common occurrence.

I would think that those voters in the states legally requiring their electors to vote as the popular election dictates would have a legitimate case to bring before the Supreme Court against the remaining states as legalized chicanery cannot be allowed to destroy the election process. If elections don't mean anything, this country quickly goes to hell in a hand basket. Liberals have done their very best to destroy the process as well as respect for the results of the election for the past few cycles. They didn't accept Bush winning in 2000, they didn't accept Trump winning in 2016, and they have done everything they can to diminish the elections of 2020. Add faithless elector activism to this mix and their will be serious blow back.

[Gritty]

These thuggish purveyors of un-American elections must think Hillary is going to run and “win” again - or they’ll get away with their usual election fraud.

[Republican Wildcat]

I don’t disagree with that at all - give it back to Maryland except the specific Federal government entities. Then they could have their “representation” they claim they don’t have.