How to fix the Electoral College

One of the most undemocratic features of the U.S. presidential elections is the Electoral College.

Americans vote not for candidates, but for electors.  The split in the electoral vote is often very different from the popular vote.  In 2000 and 2016, the winner of the popular vote lost in the Electoral College.

Each state chooses a number of electors equal to the number of its senators and representatives.  Representatives are apportioned according to population, but each state gets two senators.  A lot of small states with only one representative still have two senators, which means small states are over-represented.

A Constitutional amendment to fix the Electoral College is unlikely because it would require the votes of small states that benefit from the present setup.  So is a proposed interstate compact, in which states agree to cast their electoral votes for whoever won the popular vote.

But there is an alternate plan that would go a long way toward fixing the disparities in the electoral vote.

We can repeal the Permanent Apportionment Act of 1929, which fixed the number of Representatives at 435, and then institute the Wyoming Rule (the smallest state population – Wyoming – gets one representative and all other states get a number of representatives equal to the number of “Wyomings” that their population contains).

The total number of reps in the US House increases from 435 to 573, which also affects the Electoral College. Wyoming still stays at one rep while the California delegation increase from 53 to 68. Blue states in general do much better.

By matching the number of reps to actual population a lot of the unfairness of the Electoral College is mitigated. The number of EC votes needed to win the White House increases from 270 to 339 and the new EC votes are mostly in Blue States.

An analysis of the Wyoming Rule on Wikipedia indicates that, if the Wyoming Rule had been in effect in 2000 and 2016, the outcome might have been the same.  It wouldn’t fix everything, but it would be a big improvement.

It also would make it easier for the Democrats to control the House of Representatives.  The one-state, one-representative rule, combined with a cap on total representatives, does create disparities in the number of people in each congressional district.

The new Congress could also grant statehood to Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia.

And it could tie all federal aid to states to an elimination of gerrymandering practices.  It could require congressional and statehouse districts to be apportioned by bi-partisan commissions.  The courts might overrule this one, but it’s worth a try.

LINKS

The Wyoming Rule on Wikipedia.

The Reapportionment Act of 1929 Explained on Everything Explained.

Fix the Electoral College by Increasing the House of Representatives by Kevin Baker for The Street.

What Happens Now? by Charles Stross on Charlie’s Diary.

Can we have a fair election?

In a capitalist democracy, there are two sources of power—money power and people power.

These days money power is flourishing—partly because of court decisions that say spending money is free speech under the First Amendment, and that corporations have First Amendment rights, but more simply because of the enormous concentration of wealth.

At the same time, Republican state legislatures are rigging the election process through gerrymandering, and figuring out ways to disqualify voters, especially blacks, Hispanics and students, and make it more difficult to register to vote.

An analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice indicated that the reduction in the number of votes as a result of voter suppression laws in 2014 was greater than the margin of victory in the North Carolina and Virginia Senate races and in the Kansas and Florida Governorship races.

The Brennan Center can’t prove that the suppressed voters would have voted for the losing candidate, but that’s not the point.  Voting should be regarded as a basic American right.  If it isn’t, we Americans might as well go back to being ruled by hereditary monarchs and aristocrats.

Elizabeth Drew wrote that it is telling how few Republicans participated in the 50th anniversary of the Selma, Alabama, voting rights march.

Investigative reporter Brad Friedman reported electronic voting machines are an even more insidious threat to voting rights, because your vote can be canceled without your knowledge.   He told how easy it is to tamper with electronic voting machines without detection.  Internet voting is even worse.

The political scene: November 3, 2014

It is better to vote for what you want and not get it,

than vote for what you don’t want and get it.

==Eugene V. Debs

****************************************************

Nothing Left: The long, slow surrender of American liberals by Adolph Reed for Harper’s.

We are all right-wingers now: How Fox News, ineffective liberals, corporate Dems and GOP money captured everything, an interview of Adolph Reed by Thomas Frank for Salon.  Highly recommended.  (Hat tip to Steve Badrich)

Political scientist Adolph Reed expounded in his essay and in Thomas Frank’s interview on the learned helplessness of liberals, and their willingness to settle for the lesser evil.

Voting in itself will not change things, he said, and neither will protest demonstrations or blogging (ouch!).  Only a sustained political workers’ movement, not beholden to either political party, can bring about necessary social change.

Obama Is a Republican by Bruce Bartlett for The American Conservative.

Bruce Bartlett wrote that Barack Obama is guided by the philosophy of Richard M. Nixon, not Saul Alinsky.  In time, conservatives will come to appreciate that Obama was one of them, he said, just as they have come to appreciate Bill Clinton.

There’s One Thing at Stake in the Senate Race by Jonathan Chait for New York magazine.

If Republicans gain control of the U.S. Senate, they will block President Obama’s nominations of federal judges and government administrators.  With all of the faults of the Democrats cited by Adolph Reed, they at least allow the government to function.

Nothing in Moderation by Thomas B. Edsall for the New York Times.

A recent study indicates that voters are more extreme in their views than politicians.  The reason this doesn’t necessarily show up on public opinion surveys is that many individuals are at the extreme “left” of the imaginary political spectrum on some issues, and the extreme “right” on other issues.   It doesn’t mean they’re inconsistent.  It means the left|right and red|blue divisions are arbitrary.

Righteous rage, impotent fury: Thomas Frank returns to Kansas to hunt the last days of Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts for Slate.

Governor Sam Brownback and Senator Pat Roberts have failed to do anything to benefit ordinary Kansans.  Will waging the culture war be enough to keep them in office one more time?  We’ll see.

US midterm elections – The Guardian briefing.

 

Elections do not a democracy make

Another thing we Americans should take into account when criticizing the Egyptian political culture is that our government for decades has propped up an Egyptian dictatorship which has crushed a free press, independent civic organizations and the other institutions that make democracy possible.

Few despots are powerful enough to stamp out organized religion, so, when no other means are available, opposition to the dictator often takes a religious form.  This was true of Iran under the Shah, it was true of Poland under the Communists.

I don’t say that Egypt would be a well-functioning democracy if only the U.S. hadn’t interfered.  I don’t know enough to make a statement one way or the other.  I do say the Egyptians and the other peoples of  the Middle East would be better off if the U.S. government ceased interfering with their government and politics.

Anyhow, we Americans have a highly dysfunctional democracy ourselves, and no foreign power to blame it on..

The cartoon is by Joel Pett of the Lexington Herald-Leader.  Hat tip to jobsanger.

The high cost of politics

Hat tip for the infographic to United Republic.

Richard Nixon’s rule

A person should not run for President unless what they were saying on the campaign trail was markedly different from what the other candidates were saying.

Slay the gerrymander!

I just got back from voting at my neighborhood polling place.

I voted in New York’s 28th congressional district, the so-called “earmuffs” or “headphones” district, which looks like this: –

I voted in New York’s 55th state senate district, which looks like this: –

I voted in New York’s 131st state assembly district, which looks like this: –

And I am sure these far from being the most absurdly and arbitrarily drawn congressional and legislative district.

The only requirements for drawing district boundaries are that (1) the districts be roughly equal in population and (2) the boundaries not be drawn to intentionally reduce representation of minority groups.  Isn’t it time to add (3) the districts be compact in shape, (4) the districts as much as possible, subject to requirements 1-3, respect historic governmental and community boundaries and (5) the district be drawn by a non-partisan commission, subject to an up-or-down vote by the state legislature?  It might even be possible find a computer algorithm for doing this.

I voted for Kenneth Krause, the Republican candidate for Assembly, because he has signed a pledge to support non-partisan redistricting of the Assembly.  Of course the Assembly is gerrymandered to favor Democrats, as the state Senate is gerrymandered to favor Republicans, so he has less to lose than if he were a Republican.

Democrats’ timidity has not paid off

I respect a politician who sticks by principles when they’re unpopular.

I understand a politician who does the popular thing even if it goes against principles.

What I don’t understand or respect are politicians who abandon their principles even when those principles have public support.

Public opinion polls show a majority of Americans would rather have government spending to create jobs than cutbacks in spending to reduce the budget deficit.

They show that a majority of Americans would be happy to allow the upper-bracket tax cuts to expire on schedule.

And they show that a majority of Americans favor tough regulation of the big banks and Wall Street investment firms.

All these are things that President Obama and the other national Democratic leaders say they want. What, then, is the problem?  Why do they hesitate?  Why are they so timid in what they propose?

The Gallup poll in the chart above is just one poll.  Other polls show a more nearly even race, but none of them are encouraging for the Democrats.  But after all, if the Democrats don’t believe in their own platform, why should anybody else?

[Update 9/8/10]  Here’s a new poll with different results.  It shows how volatile public opinion is, or how voters distrust both parties, or maybe what a large margin for error Gallup has.  But my original argument still stands.