Last night the Washington House passed a bill to join the national popular vote Compact. The bill, previously passed by the Senate, will be sent to Gov. Christine Gregoire, who is expected to sign it into law.
The new law does absolutely nothing…for now. But once enough states have signed up—so that their combined electoral votes total at least 270—all the compact states will change the way their electoral votes are allocated. Right now, all states except Nebraska and Maine use a “winner take all” system that awards a state’s electors to the winner of the state popular vote. Once the compact “kicks-in” however, the member states will allocate their electors to the winner of the national popular vote.
In other words, the Compact enables a national popular vote without the need to amend the U.S. Constitution. This is because the Constitution gives each state discretion on how electors are allocated (my emphasis):
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….
The Compact simply provides for a state-level change away from the common, but not universal, “winner-take-all” system adopted by most states through the early 1800s. The Electoral College remains completely unchanged.
A huge benefit of a national popular vote is that it greatly diminishes the influence of so-called swing states like Ohio and Florida. It is no secret that presidential candidates pander to these states and visit them more frequently during the campaign (and even after taking office). The effect is that an individual’s vote in a swing state has far more influence on the election outcome than an individual’s vote in a non-swing state. A national popular vote levels the field—everyone’s vote contributes equally to the election outcome.
The prognosis looks good for a national popular vote by 2012. So far four states (HI, IL, MD, NJ) are in the Compact. Once Washington is on board, the member states will have 61 electors behind them. Five other states (CA, CO, MA, RI, and VT) have passed similar legislation and await a Governor’s signature. All but two states (ID and DE) have at least introduced the legislation, but even these two states have bills drafted. All this comes after about three years of effort.
More information on the state Compact and the national popular vote effort can be found here.
This has the effect of officially bringing to a close the era of geographical affinity in national political strategy. Which is the real change signaled by this past Presidential election.
Voter affinity is no longer defined by geography to the extent that an effective national political strategy can exploit it. The only remaining vestiges are the electoral college, and the winner-take-all policies (and states like Wyoming having more U.S. Senate seats than Congressional Districts). Modern voters define their common affinities in more complex terms having very little to do with geography or locale. The genius of the Obama campaign was to recognize this and to leverage new technology to connect with those political affinity groups.
Tea bagging parties are an expression of fairly inept GOP efforts to play catch up.
Just what we need a new and improved way of getting exactly what we deserve. People seem to believe that because they watched 3 infomercials or talked to their aunt liz, or because the their union/school/family/friends/TV/some people at a bar told them to vote a certain way they should. Or worse, because they THINK someone is going to win, that they should vote for them, or because someone is going to lose that they shouldn’t vote for them.
I am so sick of the populist thought that the 50.01 majority knows what’s right. In actuallity they don’t. The founders of this country created an electoral system to AVOID a thing called the ‘Tyranny of the masses’. Thats when you have a lot of uneducated (in the political arena) or ignorant voters who decide what goes on.
It is conveniently overlooked that all events in human history are done by small groups. Masses do nothing until aroused out of their comfort zone to appoint someone ELSE to go do the dirty they want to ignore.
How does populist/mass stupidity actually work?
Heres an analogy.
Sheep, guided and herded by trained and specially bred dogs who are handled by professional wranglers,then brought to a market freezer nearby to feed you.
Lazy voters, informed and educated by targeted and specifically worded media that is created by professional marketers. Brought to a medium near you to get you to vote the way they want.
Excellent point you’ve got there!
Tell you what. From now on you just sit quietly and let all us strong, sensible black women make all the important decisions.
Mmmmkay?
Can someone answer me a question about this voting pact, I haven’t had much time to read the entire site, but the current poll is:
How should we elect the President?
(a) The candidate who gets the most votes in all 50 states.
(b) The current Electoral College system.
Most does not equal majority. What happens if a third party gets involved and not a single candidate gets a majority of the cast votes? It seems we still run into the problem of minority presidents if that is how this pact works. At least we could get rid of swing states though which would be nice and this might encourage more voters since your individual vote carriers more weight.
The people vote for President now in all 50 states and have done so in most states for 200 years.
So, the issue raised by the National Popular Vote legislation is not about whether there will be “mob rule” in presidential elections, but whether the “mob” in a handful of closely divided battleground states, such as Florida, get disproportionate attention from presidential candidates, while the “mobs” of the vast majority of states are ignored. In 2004, candidates spent over two thirds of their visits and two-thirds of their money in just 6 states and 99% of their money in just 16 states, while ignoring the rest of the country.
The current system does NOT provide some kind of check on the “mobs.” 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 who meet briefly in mid-December to cast their totally predictable votes in accordance with their pre-announced pledges.
Under the current system of electing the President, no state requires that a presidential candidate receive anything more than a plurality of the popular votes in order to receive all of the state’s electoral votes.
Not a single legislative bill has been introduced in any state legislature in recent decades (among the more than 100,000 bills that are introduced in every two-year period by the nation’s 7,300 state legislators) proposing to change the existing universal practice of the states to award electoral votes to the candidate who receives a plurality (as opposed to absolute majority) of the votes (statewide or district-wide). There is no evidence of any public sentiment in favor of imposing such a requirement.
I think it would be impossible to write the National Popular Vote Compact so that Republicans wouldn’t be able to cheat. Karl Rove has probably got guys working on possible cheating strategies right now.
@3
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
My momma, was a strong sensible black woman. You don’t measure up!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Golly, the libtards are still on Karl Rove…
Toooooooooooooooooo
Damnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn
Funnnnnnnnnnnnnnnny
The electoral college was created to give an advantage to the slave states over the more populated free states, so that the slave economy could continue. It’s good news that this might finally be abolished.
Jay —- The test of good government is NOT how wise the people are, the test in a democracy is whether the governors have earned the people’s trust. If a mistake is made, whether conditions have changed or the policy needs changing, the people can more readily change those in government than those in government can change themselves.
Kirk91 — The E.C. allowed as much democracy as your state could stand: women in 1700s NJ, free blacks in NY, unpropertied laborers in PA. Virginians had single member electoral college districts until Jefferson got the bright idea to shut out Adams from his 1796 VA electoral college votes. It started the undemocratic minority-disenfranchising unit rule just in time for the 1800 election. Course, Jefferson lost his MA electoral votes, too, but VA was bigger.
Susan — If mobs are not a concern like the rioting in Jacksonian days, wouldn’t states would go back to three days of balloting for each election like Europeans do? And, won’t court challenges arising from npv switching electors cause so much delay, that the Electoral College will end up choosing the President anyway? And if not the E.C., I fear most the idea of a court appointed president.