Joe Mathews, co-author of California Crack-up, and also author of the The People’s Machine (about the Schwarzenegger governorship) says Californians should support a measure to elect one presidential elector from each U.S. House district. Ted Costa has already announced plans to get such an initiative on the June 2012 ballot (or the February 2012 ballot, if California holds an election then).
See the Mathews column here. Mathews does not really believe it is good policy for California to elect one presidential elector from each congressional district. But he says Californians should support it anyway, at least to the point of putting it on the ballot. His reasoning is that California could use the measure as a bargaining chip to win more federal help for its budget crisis. If the measure were enacted and took effect before the November 2012 election, that would injure the President’s chances of being re-elected, because under current law, he can reasonably expect to win all of California’s 55 electoral votes in 2012. But if the measure were in effect, he would probably receive approximately 20 fewer electoral votes.
Ted Costa has successfully placed other initiatives on the California ballot in the past.
I think all states should use the Congressional District method of the Electoral College. Of course that is their individual decision, but I think it would be best personally.
File this under “transparent bluffs.” (And, man, don’t ADMIT it’s a bluff right out of the gate!)
@1: Sure, it’d be best overall if every state decided to do it this way, but it’s better for each state individually if they don’t. Which is why 48 states are winner-take-all, and one of the two holdouts is having a serious discussion (i.e., not a transparent bluff) about giving in.
That idea would tilt our elections in a direction that is favorable to the Republican Party and unfavorable to the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party wins overwhelmingly majorities in many urban districts, whereas most Republican congressional districts are not so one-sided. If the country had followed those rules in 1960, Richard Nixon would have won in the electoral vote, and George W Bush would have won in the electoral vote in 2000 by a much larger margin than he actually received.
What’s wrong with just letting the person who gets the most popular vote be considered the winner?
Good point; national popular vote is even better. (And I’ll note that the NPV laws only trigger when a majority of states agree to it, sidestepping the collective action problem.)
Dividing a state’s electoral votes by congressional district would magnify the worst features of the Electoral College system. What the country needs is a national popular vote to make every person’s vote equally important to presidential campaigns.
If the district approach were used nationally, it would less be less fair and less accurately reflect the will of the people than the current system. In 2004, Bush won 50.7% of the popular vote, but 59% of the districts. Although Bush lost the national popular vote in 2000, he won 55% of the country’s congressional districts.
The district approach would not cause presidential candidates to campaign in a particular state or focus the candidates’ attention to issues of concern to the state. Under the 48 state-by-state winner-take-all laws(whether applied to either districts or states), candidates have no reason to campaign in districts or states where they are comfortably ahead or hopelessly behind. In North Carolina, for example, there are only 2 districts the 13th with a 5% spread and the 2nd with an 8% spread) where the presidential race is competitive. In California, the presidential race is competitive in only 3 of the state’s 53 districts. Nationwide, there are only 55 “battleground” districts that are competitive in presidential elections. Under the present deplorable 48 state-level winner-take-all system, two-thirds of the states (including California and Texas) are ignored in presidential elections; however, seven-eighths of the nation’s congressional districts would be ignored if a district-level winner-take-all system were used nationally.
In 2008, both political parties spent a considerable amount of money and effort trying to win the 2nd district in Nebraska. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential candidate, visited the district during the post-convention general election campaign. Both parties paid attention to the 2nd district because it was a closely divided battleground district where one electoral vote was at stake. The outcome was that Barack Obama carried the 2nd district by 3,378 votes and won one electoral vote in Nebraska.
One Nebraska state senator whose district lies partially in the 2nd congressional district reported a heavy concentration of lawn signs, mailers, precinct walking, telephone calls to voters, and other campaign activity related to the presidential race in the portion of his state senate district that was inside the 2nd congressional district, but no such activity in the remainder of his state senate district. Indeed, the Obama and McCain presidential campaigns did not pay the slightest attention to the people of Nebraska’s reliably Republican 1st and 3rd congressional districts, because it was a foregone conclusion that McCain would win the most popular votes in both of those districts. The issues relevant to voters of the 2nd district (the Omaha area) mattered, while the (very different) issues relevant to the remaining (mostly rural) two-thirds of the state were irrelevant.
Similarly, in Maine (which also awards electoral votes by congressional district), the closely divided 2nd congressional district received campaign events in 2008 (whereas Maine’s 1st reliably Democratic district was ignored).
Also, with the district method, a second-place candidate could still win the White House without winning the national popular vote.
A national popular vote is the way to make every person’s vote equal and guarantee that the candidate who gets the most votes in all 50 states becomes President.
It won’t work. Such an initiative will be so clearly doomed to fail that it wouldn’t be seen as a threat at all.
Even Arnold Schwarzenegger, who Joe Mathews’ adores, would have to oppose it to be consistent, because he vetoed the National Popular Vote Compact (twice).
– d
What’s wrong in the information age for the most knowable, ‘plugged in’ population in history voting directly?
Democans and Republicrats have sailed the ship of state on to the rock, local – state – national, repeatedly!
#3 Richard Nixon won the popular vote in 1960, so it is not unreasonable that he would win the electoral vote.
It would make more sense to use popular elections for nominating presidential candidates. I doubt that even Susan Mvymvy could rationalize the current system, unless she really likes funny hats.
California could simply switch to direct nomination and let each state party designate associated party primaries in other states that would also be counted.
#5 which are the 3 CD’s in California that you characterize as competitive?
Instead of shoring up big vote states [possibly fraudulent Texas and Illinois], trickie dick spent the last days in Alaska and Hawaii. I also heard him first on radio on the debates and thot he ‘won’ the same. On television he was definitely out classed, via ‘style verses substance’. Oh course Ike did not help Dickie one little bit, even tho David and Tricia were later married.
Jim, the official popular vote count for 1960 records a plurality for Kennedy, not Nixon. Of course there was the voter fraud, referenced by Donald, which allegedly benefitted JFK.
Richard Nixon did not win the popular vote in 1960. The only plausible theory that he did win, involves eliminating sixth-elevenths of Kennedy’s popular vote in Alabama. There were only five electors on the Alabama ballot in 1960 who were pledged to Kennedy, so some people have deducted over half of Kennedy’s popular votes. But that is not consistent with how any previous presidential election vote was ever calculated. In 1948, there were only ten electors pledged to Harry Truman on the Tennessee ballot (Tennessee had 12 electoral votes at the time). But no one has ever deducted one-sixth of Truman’s popular votes from his Tennessee vote total. Norman Thomas only had one candidate for presidential elector on the ballot in Minnesota all the years he ran, but no one ever shrunk down Norman Thomas’s popular vote to only one-eleventh or only one-twelfth, because of that.
The truth is that most of the people who voted Democratic in Alabama in 1960 were actually voting both for Kennedy and for Harry Byrd. That is one of the oddities of the electoral college system. For all states before 1920, voters were able to vote for multiple presidential candidates if they wished, because all states let voters vote for one candidate for presidential elector on one ticket, and another elector candidate in another ticket, etc., etc. If a state had as many as 6 electoral votes and had as many as 6 slates of presidential elector on the ballot, a voter could vote for 6 different presidential candidates.
Currently, the Presidential Electors are select by a “winner take all” process that is dominated by the mega urban areas. Los Angeles and the Bay area select whom all voters in California will support for president.
All other voters have no voice, and no input who will be the next president.
This is wrong and against the system the founding fathers designed. George Washington in 1788 was elected by Congressional District Electors.
Why the Electoral College Reform is a really good idea!
* $100,000,000 will be spent in California in media purchases in the Presidential campaigns. More Jobs
* Presidential candidates will be forced to come to California. California is largely taken for granted by Presidential candidates because of the “winner take all” system of awarding electoral votes. In recent elections, Presidential candidates have ignored voters in California and have spent more time and money trying to win votes in smaller states with a few electoral votes.
* Independent votes will matter. Further, a “winner take all” system eliminates credible third party or independent candidacies for President.
* Rural voters will have a voice
* Mega urban areas will not dominate the process.
* California will reflect its political demography. The new system of awarding electoral votes will reflect the vast diversity of our state, the regional differences of our citizenry, and the unique problems face by Californians.
* Returns the power of the vote back to the people and not the special interest ruling elite.
* Maine and Nebraska have Congressional District Electors.
* It reinforces our founding fathers concept of representative government.
* Grass roots involvement in the Presidential election.
Obama won 44 congressional Districts with no effort by McCain. Only 3 CD would be competitive is pure BS!
All 53 CD would be winnable if the voters were ignored under the CD Electors plan.
Half the votes in half the gerrymander areas – States, Districts, whatever = about 25 percent ANTI-Democracy minority rule.
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P.R. legislative
NONPARTISAN App.V. executive/judicial
How many nations manage to survive by having their national chief executive officer(s) be elected by ALL of the Electors in such nations ???
Do the candidates somehow ignore ANY precincts in such nations ???
*bargaining chip* = EXTORTION — to bail out one more rotted to the core gerrymander regime ??? Duh.
For the brain dead — the Electoral College was one part of the super-EVIL compromises in the 1787 top secret Federal Convention by the oligarchs at the time.
slave = 3/5 person
min 1 Rep per State
2 Senators per State
Electoral College math.
One giant EVIL oligarchy mess.
Democracy NOW to end the EVIL rot.
The National Popular Vote bill is superior in its benefits over the current state-by-state winner-take-all system and the congressional district method.
Every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. Every vote, everywhere would be counted for and directly assist the candidate for whom it was cast. Candidates would need to care about voters across all the states, not just undecided voters in a handful of swing states or swing districts.
The Popular vote for President people have been so intent in pushing their flawed system on the American people that they’ve neglected to consider elections like 1960. The popular vote total between Nixon and Kennedy was extremely close considering the number of votes cast that year.
Before either Major candidate could be declared the over-all winner EVERY SINGLE ONE of the 200,000+ precincts would be FORCED to do a re-count. If you thought Florida did such a bang-up job in only 4 Counties being re-counted in 2000, multiple THAT by nearly 800! In these times of reduced goverment revenues WHO will pay for this national re-count.
How about the States that went heavily for the second-place candidate? Do you really think that they won’t be stricter in the hand re-count of all the ballots cast for the runner-up candidate? AND remember all those ballots must be Counted and Certified in time for the Electoral College vote in mid-December.
Additionally, no State has yet permitted its voters to approve this change in their vote for President. This is mostly the work of Democratic legislatures and Governors. Some people just can’t accept that Gore lost in 2000 and this is their revenge. This scheme is a direct attack on Federalism. I think this is an electoral nightmare designed to shift power away from Congress.
Incidentally, it hasn’t happened in over 40 years but occassionally 3rd party candidates DO win States. How are these popular vote people going to justify ignoring the U. S. Constitution’s mandate that the 3 highest Electoral College winners are to be decided BY Congress when no-one wins an outright majority of the Electoral vote?
It sure would be interesting to see how these people would justify denying many voters of their minority rights. Changing Electoral College votes from the winner after the fact, so to speak, would almost certainly see law-suits filed in many States. At least, the lawyers will be happy with this unexpected fee bonanza.
Comments are requested from any-one.
The idea that recounts will be more likely and messy is distracting. Recounts are far more likely in the current system of state-by-state winner-take-all methods.
The possibility of recounts should not even be a consideration in debating the merits of a national popular vote. No one has ever suggested that the possibility of a recount constitutes a valid reason why state governors or U.S. Senators, for example, should not be elected by a popular vote.
The question of recounts comes to mind in connection with presidential elections only because the current system so frequently creates artificial crises and unnecessary disputes.
A nationwide recount would not happen. We do and would vote state by state. Each state manages its own election and recount. The state-by-state winner-take-all system is not a firewall, but instead causes unnecessary fires. The larger the number of voters in an election, the smaller the chance of close election results.
Recounts in presidential elections would be far less likely to occur under a national popular vote system than under the current state-by-state winner-take-all system (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in each separate state).
Based on a recent study of 7,645 statewide elections in the 26-year period from 1980 through 2006 by FairVote:
*The average change in the margin of victory as a result of a statewide recount was a mere 274 votes.
*The original outcome remained unchanged in over 90% of the recounts.
*The probability of a recount is 1 in 332 elections (23 recounts in 7,645 elections), or once in 1,328 years.
The Founding Fathers only said in the U.S. Constitution about presidential elections: “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors . . .” The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly characterized the authority of the state legislatures over the manner of awarding their electoral votes as “plenary” and “exclusive.”
Federalism concerns the allocation of power between state governments and the national government. The National Popular Vote bill concerns how votes are tallied, not how much power state governments possess relative to the national government. The powers of state governments are neither increased nor decreased based on whether presidential electors are selected along the state boundary lines, along district lines (as has been the case in Maine and Nebraska), or national lines.
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).
Under the current state-by-state winner-take-all laws, the votes of the minority voters in each state are not counted for their candidate(s).
Most voters don’t care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state . . . they care whether he/she wins the White House. Voters want to know, that even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was counted and mattered to their candidate.
NO UNIFORM definition of a LEGAL vote in the NPV S-C-H-E-M-E.
How many children, felons, foreign human aliens and outer space aliens will be voting for a U.S.A. Prez if the NPV SCHEME somehow takes effect ???
The growing monarchy stuff (especially since 1932) connected with the Prez office/person is a certain sign of DOOM for REAL Democracy.
Uniform definition of Elector in ALL of the U.S.A.
NONPARTISAN App.V.
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NO pre-school MORON fixes — NPV, IRV, etc. etc. etc.
#11 and #12 How many popular votes did John Bell get in New York in 1860? Did Lincoln get 53.7% or 30.2% of the vote in that state by your reckoning?
#20 Would the National Popular Vote bill guarantee that the nominees would be the candidates who received the most popular votes from their respective party’s voters?
#18 Susan, where may the complete list of 7645 elections that were included in the Fairvote study be found?
National Popular Vote has nothing to do with the primaries or party’s choice of nominees.
Fair Vote. 2007. Survey and Analysis of Statewide Election Recounts 1980-2006 available at http://www.fairvote.org/reports/?page=1786&articlemode=showspecific&showarticle=2736.
Electoral College Votes based upon Congressional Districts would make the re-districting process even more politically charged than it already is.
#26 — Instant new gerrymanders using the latest gerrymander data in Prez election years — or even new gerrymanders every 2 years – if not annually.
See the TX gerrymander case by the SCOTUS math morons.
How many gerrymander districts can be won by 50 percent plus 1 or even less than 50 percent (with 3rd parties and independents) ???
See the 1860 Prez minority rule gerrymander math — count the 620,000 DEAD Americans on both sides in 1861-1865.
P.R. and App.V.
#25 That study is embarrassingly bad. They actually looked at results from 7 years (2000-6), counted 1699 statewide elections (over half of which were ballot measures). It then divided by 6 to come up with an average of 283 elections per year. It multiplied that by 27 to come up with an estimate of 7645 statewide elections between 1980-2006.
They did not study 7645 elections between 1980 and 2006.
Somehow the authors decided to consider the period from 2000-2006 as being 6 years, but the period from 1980-2006 as being 27 years. So even their estimation calculation is bad.
Moreover, their 7 years covered 4 even-numbered years so that it would include two elections for president, and every other office that is contested on a 4-year cycle. For example, they counted 102 statewide presidential races. 102 divided by 6 is 17 elections per year. The study would project that there had been 459 statewide presidential races between 1980-2006. There have been 7 presidential elections from 1980 to 2006. We can therefore estimate, based on the Fairvote methodology, that there are 65.57 states (and other jurisdictions).
Statewide contests are likely not as close as national presidential elections, and yet the study implies that they are, by projecting the rate (albeit miscalculated) of recounts in statewide races to presidential elections.
In the 2000-2006 period there were 100 statewide races in Texas, which were presumably counted among the 1699 in the national sample. In the period 1980-2006 there were 7 presidential elections. 61 of the Texas elections had a larger margin than the widest presidential race (ie the 18% blow out in 1984 of Walter Mondale, who carried only one State, was closer than the average race in Texas. 86 of the 100 Texas races were wider margins than the 2nd largest margin (10% in 1980).
If one were to project Texas statewide races to the national presidential elections, then in 332 elections over 1328 years, there would be no recount, one less than that estimated by the Fairvote study, but 139 races where the popular vote margin was wider than the largest margin in the last 46 presidential elections (1920 26.17% Harding over Cox).
There would simply be extremely rare cases where the popular vote and electoral vote would be in disagreement, which indicates that the NPV plan is a useless and unnecessary elaboration.
The Fairvote study showed 10 recounts in the 7 years that they actually counted elections, and 9 in the other 20 years where they mis-estimated elections. The rate of recalls per year in the latter period was 4.3 that in the earlier period. I’d be wary of using a single rate for the entire period.
#25 Isn’t the 1912 election where Teddy Roosevelt was denied the presidency, more problematic than the 1960 election where Richard Nixon was?
#26 You have confirmed my argument. Congressional Districts Electors would make the redistricting process even more politically charged than it already is.
We need presidential campaigning in California which does did not exist in past campaigns.
It appears that a Stalinist dictatorship is your agenda.
#30 I as just pointing out the obvious, that this is a double edged sword. Gerrymandering puts one party in control of the Congressional District Maps. But then again, it may not make any difference since the party in control of the gerrymandering got there by winning a majority of the state in the first place.
Or you could argue the Constitutional route – it is the United STATES of America, not the United CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS of America.
#31 About 30 percent controls the gerrymander process — which AIN’T a majority of any State.
ALL States have ANTI-Democracy gerrymander oligarchies — since day 1 on 4 July 1776.
P.R. and App.V.
Ok – A majority of those voting.
Of course in most elections a plurality of citizens don’t bother to vote
# 33 In many gerrymander districts lots of voters do NOT vote since it is a waste of time and effort —
Donkeys in 60 percent plus Elephant districts.
Elephants in 60 percent plus Donkey districts.
Other folks do NOT vote since they can NOT read a ballot — due to the rotted to the core public schools since whenever.