Why winning states matters
Without a doubt, one can make good arguments for abolishing the complicated systems in place and replacing them with a simple popular vote metric.
But there's a reason the electoral college--and the Democratic and Republican Parties' state-by-state processes--were chosen in the first place: they help to ensure that the states with smaller populations are not excluded from the equation. As has been clear from this year's primaries, the perspectives and predilections of voters in the 50 states vary considerably. If we relied simply on a popular vote, winning the huge population centers of the coasts would be sufficient, and the voices of those in less populated, more rural areas would be lost.
Like much of our government which the Constitution defines, the electoral college is a compromise: an effort to balance the will of the majority with the rights of minorities.
Today's Las Vegas Review-Journal had this to say:
"We're going to fight as hard as we can in these states. We want to send the message now that we're going to go after them, and I expect to win them," Sen. Obama said Monday.
Sen. McCain responded Monday that Obama "has no experience, no knowledge or background" on Western issues. "I believe as a Western senator I understand the issues, the challenges of the future for these ... states," the Arizona senator told The Associated Press.
Unstated in all this is the way such mathematics bear out the wisdom of the Founding Fathers in establishing the Electoral College, in the first place.
If presidents were elected "at large" by a straight majority of the national popular vote, it's unlikely the concerns of a few thousand Westerners would draw much more than the occasional bulk-mailed flier.
The real electoral battle would be for major population centers in California and east of the Mississippi, where the campaigns -- even more than is already the case -- would likely turn into huge potlatches, the candidates viewing the rural states as little more than cash drawers, suffering silently as the parties poured their looted largess into the vote-heavy cities.
Make no mistake, the candidates are here, asking what concerns residents of the rural West, only because Americans cast their presidential ballots state by state.
Labels: election2008, history
posted by michael at 5:36 PM
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1 Comments:
In fact, the small states are the most disadvantaged of all under the current system of electing the President. Political clout comes from being a closely divided battleground state, not the two-vote bonus.
Small states are almost invariably non-competitive in presidential election. Only 1 of the 13 smallest states are battleground states (and only 5 of the 25 smallest states are battlegrounds).
Of the 13 smallest states, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Alaska regularly vote Republican, and Rhode Island, Delaware, Hawaii, Vermont, Maine, and DC regularly vote Democratic. These 12 states together contain 11 million people. Because of the two electoral-vote bonus that each state receives, the 12 non-competitive small states have 40 electoral votes. However, the two-vote bonus is an entirely illusory advantage to the small states. Ohio has 11 million people and has “only” 20 electoral votes. As we all know, the 11 million people in Ohio are the center of attention in presidential campaigns, while the 11 million people in the 12 non-competitive small states are utterly irrelevant. Nationwide election of the President would make each of the voters in the 12 smallest states as important as an Ohio voter.
The fact that the bonus of two electoral votes is an illusory benefit to the small states has been widely recognized by the small states for some time. In 1966, Delaware led a group of 12 predominantly low-population states (North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Utah, Arkansas, Kansas, Oklahoma, Iowa, Kentucky, Florida, Pennsylvania) in suing New York in the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that New York’s use of the winner-take-all effectively disenfranchised voters in their states. The Court declined to hear the case (presumably because of the well-established constitutional provision that the manner of awarding electoral votes is exclusively a state decision). Ironically, defendant New York is no longer a battleground state (as it was in the 1960s) and today suffers the very same disenfranchisement as the 12 non-competitive low-population states. A vote in New York is, today, equal to a vote in Wyoming—both are equally worthless and irrelevant in presidential elections.
The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC). The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes—that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538). When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
The bill would make every vote politically relevant in a presidential election. It would make every vote.
The National Popular Vote bill has been approved by 18 legislative chambers in large and small states (one house in Colorado, Arkansas, Maine, North Carolina, Rhode Island, and Washington, and two houses in Maryland, Illinois, Hawaii, California, and Vermont). It has been enacted into law in Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, and Maryland. These states have 50 (19%) of the 270 electoral votes needed to bring this legislation into effect.
See http://www.NationalPopularVote.com
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