On June 30, the California Assembly passed SB 37, the National Popular Vote Plan bill. It has passed the State Senate in 2007. The vote in the Assembly was 45-30.

The California legislature had also passed the idea in 2006, but Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger had vetoed it. Later this summer, the bill will return to the Senate for another vote, because a miniscule change was made in the wording while the bill was in the Assembly. This was so the sponsor of the bill, Senator Carole Migden, can completely control the timing of when the bill gets to the Governor. Since the bill doesn’t have enough support to survive a gubernatorial veto, there will be a serious attempt to persuade the Governor to sign it this year. One argument to persuade him is that if the National Popular Vote Plan really makes headway, it will be easier to amend the U.S. Constitution along the lines of U.S. Senator Bill Nelson’s SJR 39. And if the move to amend the Constitution gathers steam, it should be possible to put into the same Amendment a repeal of the provision that makes Schwarzenegger ineligible to be president. The Electoral College, and the requirement that the president be natural-born, are both in Article II, sec. 1.