According to the Chief Clerk of the Hawaii House of Representatives, the National Popular Vote Plan bill cannot be enacted this year. The legislature had passed it in April (SB 1956), but Governor Linda Lingle had vetoed it. The Senate overrode her veto, but the House adjourned before getting to the bill. It had been thought that the House had another chance to override the veto in a special session in July, but that is not true.
That’s too bad, I was hoping that Hawaii would pass it this year. Well, theres always next year, and we still have Illinois with a strong possibility. It looks as if the California State Senate will pass it too, although the Governor is another story. It seems with all the time and effort it takes passing it state by state, this effort might be better served with an amendment process?
1.) Has anyone who reads this blogblurb ever cared to read the US Constitution to see where it says that the people have the right to vote for the president?
2.) Can you find out where it’s mentioned? On a similar note, along with your reading of the Constitution, you should read the Declaration of Independence.
3.) Can you tell me how many times you find the word “democracy†in either of those two very important documents?
4.) Can anyone tell me the core definition of democracy?
5.) Based on those two documents and the answers you found above, can you tell me why our founding fathers chose to create a government that was NOT a democracy?
Well if you to argue late 1700s politics, Madison/Hamilton/Jay in the Federalist Papers also strongly opposed placing term limits on the office of presidency. This was in paper #LXXII… but then, the 22nd amendment to the Constitution went against the opinions of some of the founding fathers! Gasp!
That they opposed electing the president via nation wide popular vote in the 1780s doesn’t convince me that it has any relevance to today. BTW, I’m also from one of the “small states” that allegedly “benefits” from this.
Joel asks whether this effort might be better served with an amendment process?
The conventional wisdom is that solving the Electoral College problem by consitutional amendment is literally impossible. If something is extremely difficult, it’s still easier than something else that’s impossible.
I’m not privy to the thinking of the backers of NPV. But I strongly suspect they had their eyes open when they started and are willing to be very patient.
The “Electoral College problem” is actually two problems: (1) you can win with fewer votes than the loser, and (2) you can win with less than majority support. The NPV proposal solves (1) but not (2).
It’s apparently not feasible to incorporate IRV (or any majority method) in an interstate compact, so those who support this approach have to hope that its success would eventually break the Constitutional logjam.
Let me add one additional “problem” to Bob Richard’s list: That today’s national “popular vote” is not truly representative of the nation.
That’s because so many states (2/3, at least) are non-competititve and have lower voter participation that the battleground states.
Until every vote is equal via a national popular vote (via the NPV plan or a constitutional amendment), that will continue to be the case.
Until every *voter* knows that his or her vote counts equally for the national office of president — regardless of how others in his or her state happen to vote — we will not elect a president who represents a large, broad, healthy cross-section of *all* Americans.
Bob is right, too, that NPV could/should pave the way for a constitutional amendment that includes a majority requirement/IRV.
P.S. To BlueCollarPolitico’s questions, the “republic, not a democracy” argument is a fallacy. To (some of) the founders, “democracy” meant *direct democracy*, where every citizen votes on every issue. That is far different from the constitutional republic they fashioned that is governed via *representative* democracy. To suggest otherwise is to suggest that a “republic” means that yes, we have popular voting for our representatives, but that some people can/should have a more meaningful vote than others. That’s not defensible in America, 2007, nor is it what the founders intended.
Thanks,
DB
Does anyone know if the HI House can override the veto when it reconvenes in 2008? Or would the legislative process need to start all over again? Or would the 2008 legislature be unable to pass the bill due to its failure in 2007?
Thanks!