The Mississippi Constitution says all elections for statewide state office require the winner to win a majority of the popular vote, and also to carry a majority of state house districts. If no candidate does that, then the state legislature chooses the office-holder.
On May 30, several African-American voters filed a federal lawsuit against that system. McLemore v Hosemann, s.d., 3:19cv-383. The state has filed a motion to dismiss, which is pending. Thanks to Election Law Blog for this news.
So if a party wanted the state legislature to have the say all they would have to do is run a bunch of “independent” candidates making it nearly impossible for anyway to get a “majority” of either the vote or the state house districts.
Obviously an UN-EQUAL number of votes in each State Rep district
>>> one more rotted gerrymander system.
Case is a throwback to the now olde
Gray v Sanders, 372 U.S. 368 (1963) – start of one person-one vote math.
Set stage for the 1964 SCOTUS gerrymander cases.
NONPARTISAN AppV – ALL exec and judic offices.
It’s a good system as it prevents the heavily populated urban centers (and their voters on public assistance) from dominating elections. I suspect it will hold up in court.
Interesting variation on the Swiss system for National referendums.
Richard:
Do you happen to know how long this law has been in effect?
ALL political subdivisions of a State are TOTALLY ARBITRARY —
counties, districts, precincts, etc.
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ALL State boundaries in the first 48 States are TOTALLY ARBITRARY –
minor sanity in major River boundaries and Continental Divide and limited width [for 1 hour time zones].
Mess due in part to slavery/Recon. for added States in 1789-1870.
Senate gerrymander rigging in 1871-1912 added States.
This provision came into play three times in the 90’s and apparently not since then. In two of those the candidate who finished second conceded and the state House followed through. In the third, the ’99 gubernatorial election, Ronnie Musgrove and Michael Parker each won 61 House districts. Musgrove received 49.62% of the vote to Parker’s 48.52%. On a party line vote of 86-36 the Democrats in the House selected Musgrove (D) to be Governor.
See: https://mississippitoday.org/2019/02/03/based-on-state-constitution-hood-could-win-governors-race-and-not-be-seated/
Sounds like a miniature version of the 12th Amendment to the US Constitution. Mississippi might want to keep this system, so that they can model behavior for that day when the 12th Amendment actually has to be used to select our President.
I think that constitutional provision has been there starting in 1890.
MS – one of the STONE AGE ex-slave State regimes.
Lots of MS men killed off / maimed for life by the slavery oligarchs in 1861-1865 Civil WAR I.
Still recovering — 150 plus years later.
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PR and Appv and TOTSOP