tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1780864588102965235.post3129919415160585258..comments2024-03-26T05:19:02.390-04:00Comments on Walking Through the Valley..: Time to Fix the Electoral CollegeSherlockhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06318490969943297313noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1780864588102965235.post-75873893369407242602014-01-10T12:59:42.340-05:002014-01-10T12:59:42.340-05:00In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the ...In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). <br /><br />Support for a national popular vote is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in virtually every state surveyed in recent polls in recent closely divided Battleground states: CO – 68%, FL – 78%, IA 75%, MI – 73%, MO – 70%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM– 76%, NC – 74%, OH – 70%, PA – 78%, VA – 74%, and WI – 71%; in Small states (3 to 5 electoral votes): AK – 70%, DC – 76%, DE – 75%, ID – 77%, ME – 77%, MT – 72%, NE 74%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM – 76%, OK – 81%, RI – 74%, SD – 71%, UT – 70%, VT – 75%, WV – 81%, and WY – 69%; in Southern and Border states: AR – 80%, KY- 80%, MS – 77%, MO – 70%, NC – 74%, OK – 81%, SC – 71%, TN – 83%, VA – 74%, and WV – 81%; and in other states polled: AZ – 67%, CA – 70%, CT – 74%, MA – 73%, MN – 75%, NY – 79%, OR – 76%, and WA – 77%. <br /><br />Americans believe that the candidate who receives the most votes should win.<br /> <br />The National Popular Vote bill has passed 32 state legislative chambers in 21 rural, small, medium, and large states with 243 electoral votes. The bill has been enacted by 10 jurisdictions with 136 electoral votes – 50.4% of the 270 necessary to go into effect.<br /> <br />NationalPopularVote <br />Follow National Popular Vote on Facebook via NationalPopularVoteInc<br />totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1780864588102965235.post-6075910116954945682014-01-10T12:58:47.360-05:002014-01-10T12:58:47.360-05:00The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the...The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC), without needing to amend the Constitution.<br /><br />The National Popular Vote bill would change current state winner-take-all laws that award all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who get the most popular votes in each separate state (not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, but since enacted by 48 states), to a system guaranteeing the majority of Electoral College votes for, and the Presidency to, the candidate getting the most popular votes in the entire United States. <br /> <br />The bill preserves the constitutionally mandated Electoral College and state control of elections. It ensures that every vote is equal, every voter will matter, in every state, in every presidential election, and the candidate with the most votes wins, as in virtually every other election in the country.<br /> <br />Under National Popular Vote, every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in every presidential election. Every vote would be included in the state counts and national count. When states with a combined total of at least 270 electoral votes enact the bill, the candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states and DC would get the needed majority of 270+ electoral votes from the enacting states. The bill would thus guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes.<br /><br />The presidential election system that we have today was not designed, anticipated, or favored by the Founding Fathers but, instead, is the product of decades of evolutionary change precipitated by the emergence of political parties and enactment by 48 states of winner-take-all laws, not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Constitution.<br /><br />Unable to agree on any particular method for selecting presidential electors, the Founding Fathers left the choice of method exclusively to the states in section 1 of Article II of the U.S. Constitution-- "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."<br /> <br />The Constitution does not prohibit any of the methods that were debated and rejected. . Indeed, a majority of the states appointed their presidential electors using two of the rejected methods in the nation's first presidential election in 1789 (i.e., appointment by the legislature and by the governor and his cabinet). Presidential electors were appointed by state legislatures for almost a century. <br /><br />The bill uses the power given to each state by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution to change how they award their electoral votes for President. States can, and frequently have, changed their method of awarding electoral votes over the years. Historically, virtually all of the major changes in the method of electing the President, including ending the requirement that only men who owned substantial property could vote and 48 current state-by-state winner-take-all laws, have come about by state legislative action.<br /> <br />totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1780864588102965235.post-61941755254888424642014-01-10T12:53:58.390-05:002014-01-10T12:53:58.390-05:00If state electoral votes were awarded proportionat...If state electoral votes were awarded proportionate to the popular vote, all votes cast will NOT count towards election of the President.<br /><br />To use a fractional proportional method, would require a constitutional amendment to abolish the Electoral College, and could be stopped by states with as little as 3% of the U.S. population.<br /><br />Without an amendment, the office of presidential elector remains. A presidential elector is a person, and a person’s vote cannot be divided into fractions. Each state would have to use a whole-number proportional approach. <br /><br />One of the counter-intuitive aspects of the whole-number proportional approach (which retains the Electoral College and the office of presidential elector) would result in most states being ignored in presidential elections. There would be fewer battleground states under this system than under the current system. <br /><br />Campaigning is rarely capable of shifting more than 8% of the vote during a typical presidential campaign. If one considers an average-sized state (i.e., a state with 11 electoral votes), one electoral vote would correspond to 9% of the popular vote in the state. In smaller states, one electoral vote would correspond to an even larger percentage of the popular vote in the state. In a state of median size (i.e., seven electoral votes), one electoral vote would correspond to 14% of the popular vote in the state. In the case of the seven states with three electoral votes, one electoral vote would correspond to 33% of the popular vote. <br /><br />If the whole-number proportional approach had been in use throughout the country in the nation’s closest recent presidential election (2000), it would not have awarded the most electoral votes to the candidate receiving the most popular votes nationwide. Instead, the result would have been a tie of 269–269 in the Electoral College, even though Al Gore led by 537,179 popular votes across the nation. The presidential election would have been thrown into Congress. Given the composition of the U.S. House of Representatives in January 2001, the whole-number proportional approach would have resulted in the election of the second-place presidential candidate.<br /><br />A national popular vote is the way to make every person's vote equal and matter to their candidate because it guarantees that the candidate who gets the most votes in all 50 states and DC becomes President.<br />totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.com