The August 1 News & Observer (the largest newspaper in Raleigh, North Carolina) carries an editorial “The old college itch” which perpetuates the same thoughtless prejudice against minor parties that has been promulgated for decades. The editorial’s main point is to oppose the bill in the legislature to let each U.S. House district choose its own presidential elector. The reason set forth is that such a bill would “undercut the two-party system — a bad thing for political moderation and stability. Third parties — heck, even fourth and fifth parties — would have a far easier time winning Electoral College votes. That could toss elections into the U.S. House of Representatives, inviting deal-making and creating chaos.”
This editorial mis-uses the terms “two-party system” and “stability.” “Two-party system” was coined in 1911 to describe the British party system. It does not mean a system in which only two parties exist, or a system in which only two parties ever win any elections. It means a system in which two parties are much larger than other parties. Both Great Britain and Canada have two-party systems. There are only two parties in each country that have a realistic chance of winning control of the national government. But minor parties always win seats in the British and Canadian parliaments, and sometimes they win control of a region or a province. Nevertheless, Great Britain and Canada do not suffer from “instability” and their national governments are always “moderate” (as opposed to “extreme”).
The old chestnut that minor parties lead to “instability” began in the 1950’s, when Italy and France had parliamentary systems, without a popularly-elected president. Also, both nations used proportional representation. The combination of the parliamentary system and p.r., and the particular details of how p.r. worked in those two countries, led to frequent changes in national leadership in Italy and France. U.S. headlines proclaimed with monotonous regularity that the government of one or the other country has “fallen”. Premiers took power and lost power in a matter of months, or sometimes weeks. This fostered a misunderstanding in the U.S. that the very existence of a multi-party system automatically leads to instability.
Most members of Congress, and most judges, and many editorial writers, grew up in the 1950’s and 1960’s and thought they had “learned” that if minor parties are treated with equality, this would cause “instability”. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Byron White, the worst enemy of minor parties in U.S. history, always sprinked his ballot access decisions with references to “stability” (a term he never defined). Ballot Access News has written a letter to the editor of the News Observer and hopes that the newspaper will publish it.
As to the electoral college itself, there is no instance at which any minor party or independent presidential candidate would have elected anyone to the electoral college since 1972, even if every single state let each U.S. House district choose its own presidential elector. Although Ross Perot carried some counties in 1992, he didn’t carry any congressional districts.
