Lawrence Lessig’s Organization, Equal Votes, Sues Four States to End Winner-Take-All Allocation of Electoral Votes

On February 21, Lawrence Lessig’s organization, Equal Votes, filed lawsuits against California, Massachusetts, South Carolina, and Texas, alleging that these states’ decision to award electoral votes on a winner-take-all basis violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments. Here is the Massachusetts complaint. The others are similar. All four are in U.S. District Courts in their own states.

The Massachusetts case is Lyman v Baker, 1:18cv-10327. One of the plaintiffs is William Weld. As the Complaint says, Weld is a registered Libertarian.

The California case is Rodriguez v Brown, c.d., 2:18cv-1422.

The South Carolina case is Baten v McMaster, 2:18cv-510. Here is a link to that Complaint.

The Texas case is League of United Latin American Citizens v Abbott, w.d., 5:18cv-175. Here is the Texas Complaint. Thanks to Jim Riley for help with that.

Similar cases in the past in several states have not won. In Louisiana, the case was Lowe v Treen, 393 So 2d 459 (1981). In Alabama it was Hitson v Baggett, 446 F.Supp.674; 580 F.2d 1051 (1978 & 1979). In California it was Graham v Eu, 408 F.Supp.37 (n.d. 1976), affirmed 423 U.S. 1067. In Virginia it was Williams v Virginia State Board of Elections, 288 F.Supp. 622 (e.d. 1968), affirmed 393 U.S. 320 (1969). In Mississippi it was Penton v Humphrey, 264 F.Supp.250 (s.d. 1967). Also in 1966, thirteen states sued the other 37 states, arguing that all states must use districts to choose electors. That case was filed directly in the U.S. Supreme Court, but that Court refused to hear it. Delaware v New York, 385 U.S. 895.


Comments

Lawrence Lessig’s Organization, Equal Votes, Sues Four States to End Winner-Take-All Allocation of Electoral Votes — 15 Comments

  1. COMMUNIST DONKEYS ON THE MARCH ??? — see the now common 1st Amdt comments in the Complaint.

    GOOD luck in finding ANY 1st Amdt stuff in the debates about the 12th Amdt and the 14th Amdt.

    Will the lawyers be sanctioned for filing a frivolous case ???

    How BIG is the BAN database of old cases / consts / laws / regs ??? – in the low millions ???

    Abolish the Electoral College.
    Uniform definition of Elector-Voter.
    PR and AppV.

  2. Wow. I would have dismissed this, but there are some powerful lawyers on the Complaint. Doubt it can prevail, but could be interesting to watch it all unfold.

  3. @JALP, The Texas complaint (w.d. 5:18-cv-00175) is brought by LULAC, and includes a VRA Section 2. But is otherwise pretty much a cut and paste from the other cases.

    Texas has a provision in its Constitution for handling cases where the electors can not be determined. It would be way out of bounds for a federal court to fashion an alternate election scheme.

    How would you determine whose right to vote was abridged by WTA.

  4. Would the Complaints have been filed IF the 2016 Trump and Clinton math been reversed ??? Duh.

    — IE — Clinton getting elected Prez by a minority of the popular votes ??? Duh. Duh.

    At least the math MORONS in the brain dead media and SCOTUS may see/hear something about the UNEQUAL ratios of Popular Votes / EC Votes — ie only about 10 *marginal* States / districts — for many decades.

    JALP – Donkeys unhappy that 2016 Trump barely got 1 ECV in a Maine USA Rep gerrymander district in 2016 — which *might* have produced a CRISIS if such vote had been Vote 270 of 538 to elect Trump.

    How many lawyers in the 4 cases ??? Low Hundreds ??? — Mob scene in hearings ??? — NO space for mere public ???

  5. Donkey lawyers are claiming some magical sort of 1st Amdt- 14th Amdt- 15th Amdt partisan/racial group associations magically entitle the Donkeys to get some magical percentage of the EC Votes in each State/DC.

    IE PERVERSIONS of all 3 Amdts — due to earlier SCOTUS moron stuff.

    See McPherson above.

  6. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_NNNN

    a wiki for each Prez election — NNNN = YEAR

    esp – the various methods for getting Art II-12th Amdt Prez Electors in the early elections – esp. before 1832 — esp. split States.

    What if all States and DC magically decide to appoint the Prez Elector HACK robots ??? —

    ie back to the EVIL rotted past ???

    BUT 14 Amdt, Sec. 2 — ever to be enforced ???

    See McPherson above some more.

  7. The question becomes what would a proportional allocation look like. Here is one thought, based on California’s votes (source: Dave Leip’s Atlas).

    According to that source, a total of 14,237,893 votes were cast for President in California. This includes all ballot candidates and all write ins. Here are the steps in one process for allocating those electors:

    1. Take the total number of votes and divide it by the number of Electoral votes California has, plus 1 (56). This would define the number of votes a candidate must receive for each whole number of electoral votes to be allocated. In California’s case, this would be 254,248.

    2. Divide the candidate’s votes by the number from #1 above. We get the following results for candidates that matter:

    a. Hillary: 8,753,792/ 254,248 = 34.76
    b. Trump: 4,483,814/ 254,248 = 17.81
    c. Johnson: 478,500/ 254,248 = 1.90
    d. Stein: 278,653/ 254248 = 1.10

    No other candidate would have a ratio above 1.0 (or even above 0.5)

    3. Initial allocation: allocate electoral votes based on the ratio above, rounded down to the next lowest integer. This lead to an initial allocation of Hillary, 34; Trump, 17; Johnson, 1; Stein, 1.

    4. Total the number of votes allocated in Step #3: 53

    5. Determine the remaining number of votes to be allocated: 2

    6. Allocate the remaining unallocated votes in order of the greatest number to the right of the decimal point until all votes are allocated. Johnson, at .90 is the highest, and gets the 54th electoral vote. Trump is the next highest at .63, and gets the final 55th electoral vote.

    Final allocation:

    Hillary – 34
    Trump – 18
    Johnson – 2
    Stein – 1

  8. TomP —

    What about the Method of Equal Proportions regarding fractions — used in 14th Amdt, Sec 2 math ???

    Clinton magically gets 270 or more ECV of 538 ???

    Any body gets 270 or more ECV of 538 ???

    NO body gets such 270 ECV and the Nov 2016 Prez election goes to the USA gerrymander House of Reps — 12th Amdt ???

    The H Reps are still voting on who becomes Prez (with some/many vacancies in the H Reps) ???

    Clinton and Trump both die of old age while the H Reps keeps on with more 12th Amdt votes ???

    Abolish the DARK AGE super time bomb minority rule EC.
    AppV

  9. @TomP,

    If California used proportional election for presidential electors, it is likely that more voters would have voted for Trump. More voters would likely have voted for the Sanders electors, etc.

    Alternative (Constitutional Amendment):

    (1) Presidential electors shall be apportioned among the United States and its territories on the basis of resident US citizens over the age of 18. Persons who are lawfully disenfranchised shall be be excluded. Congress shall provide for a permanent registry for such persons. The apportionment shall be made 12 months prior to each presidential election.

    (2) There shall be at least one elector for every 10,000 persons (US Citizens over the age of 18, not disenfranchised).

    (3) Presidential electors shall be chosen by popular vote. States shall have time, place, manner authority, subject to override for Congress (the same conditions as congressional elections are regulated).

    (4) Presidential electors shall meet in one convention. There may be multiple physical meeting locations if they are linked by instantaneous communication. Electors may vote for one candidate. If no candidate receives a majority of the votes cast, another vote shall be held. If the convention does not elect a president within 30 days, a new presidential election shall be held.

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