The New York has this Hendrik Hertzberg column, which rebuts common criticisms of the National Popular Vote Plan idea for presidential elections.
The New York has this Hendrik Hertzberg column, which rebuts common criticisms of the National Popular Vote Plan idea for presidential elections.
NO uniform definition of Elector-Voters in the NPV scheme from Hell.
How about children, mentally ill, felons (murderers, traitors, terrorists, etc.), foreign aliens voting for a Prez/VP in some of the usual suspect States/DC ???
The States are required to file a certificate of ascertainment that provides the basis on which they appointed their electors. A State that chooses it electors based on the national popular vote would be required to list the total popular vote for the United States – this is similar to Maine and Nebraska listing the popular vote in each congressional district, because that is how they ascertain (ie make a final definitive determination) of who was appointed for those districts.
The NPV scheme partially recognizes the problem, by requiring the SOS (or equivalent) of member States to transmit the popular vote totals for their State to the SOS of the other member States. But then they are going to have to scrounge around for the popular vote in other States. Will they use AP as an official source, or some website?
No, they somehow believe they will be able to get the vote totals from other States faced with the same deadline they themselves must meet.
In 1960, how many popular votes did Kennedy and Byrd receive in Alabama?
The problem is that in close national elections, such as 1880 or 1960, individual States might not be particularly close, and so would be unlikely to trigger State recounts.
In 2000, after it appeared that Florida had really bungled the election, some newspapers started doing a closer examination of results from their states. They would find where a candidate would gain an extra 1000 votes from some precinct where the machine had been misread. It didn’t matter for their state total, so nobody checked. Punch cards were used lots of places other than Florida.
One reason I support the National Popular Vote Plan is that I believe if the plan gets approved in virtually enough states to go into effect, the nation would then get serious about fixing the presidential election problem and pass a constitutional amendment for a direct popular vote. It would probably also provide for a national uniform definition of “voter”. The National Popular Vote Plan seems to be the only hope for reform.