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National Popular Vote - Russt - 2010-10-09
My government teacher showed us this.
http://www.nationalpopularvote.com/
National Popular Vote Wrote:Under the U.S. Constitution, the states have exclusive and plenary (complete) power to allocate their electoral votes, and may change their state laws concerning the awarding of their electoral votes at any time. Under the National Popular Vote bill, all of the state's electoral votes would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes—that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538).
Six states have signed the compact into law, and while it won't achieve an electoral majority soon, it has a real possibility to happen.
The Electoral College was originally conceived because the framers of the U.S. Constitution didn't trust the people with a direct election of the President. It was supposed to be this group of "wise" elites, chosen by the states, nominating candidates of local and national prominence, among which the top three would go to the House of Representatives for the final vote.
Currently it does little but complicate what is essentially a (less equal) popular vote.
National Popular Vote Wrote:Nationwide popular election of the President is the only system that makes all states competitive, guarantees that the candidate with the most popular votes nationwide wins the Presidency, and makes every vote equal.
Thoughts?
National Popular Vote - Spaz - 2010-10-10
It's a step in the right direction I suppose. What I'd really like to see is a different voting system that would give non-major party candidates a real chance, something like instant run-off voting.
National Popular Vote - larmie - 2010-10-10
Spaz Wrote:It's a step in the right direction I suppose. What I'd really like to see is a different voting system that would give non-major party candidates a real chance, something like instant run-off voting.
No, that would make it easier for fringe/centrist candidates to win as the United States is deeply divided between liberals and conservatives.
Taking down the state barrier would really divide the country between social, economic and racial lines...
National Popular Vote - Stereo - 2010-10-12
Assuming candidates are approximately assigned according to population, wouldn't it be easier to just have the states split their representatives based on the popular vote?
That way instead of California going like 40 in favour of Dems, it'll be 22-18 if the vote is close. And it gets rid of swing states, where 1 or 2 specific states control the entire outcome, just as effectively.
As for advantages... this means that easier to read partial results can be displayed before every state's been tallied.
National Popular Vote - Russt - 2010-10-12
Electoral votes = House seats + Senate seats. House seats are proportional to population. Senate seats are constant. What this means is that Wyoming, with 3 votes, has 180000 people represented in each vote, while California has 670000 people per vote.
Also swing states would be unwilling to enact it on an individual basis, from a game theory perspective. Take a swing state worth 9 votes, convert it to a proportional system. Suddenly instead of 9/0 vs 0/9 you have 5/4 vs 4/5, and it's now really worth only 1 vote.
National Popular Vote - larmie - 2010-10-23
Russt Wrote:Electoral votes = House seats + Senate seats. House seats are proportional to population. Senate seats are constant. What this means is that Wyoming, with 3 votes, has 180000 people represented in each vote, while California has 670000 people per vote.
Also swing states would be unwilling to enact it on an individual basis, from a game theory perspective. Take a swing state worth 9 votes, convert it to a proportional system. Suddenly instead of 9/0 vs 0/9 you have 5/4 vs 4/5, and it's now really worth only 1 vote.
It's a famous political science question in Japan as well ("一票の格差" or disproportionate representation). According to the Wikipedia page on this subject (which is only in Japanese for some reason) most countries force redrawing of electoral districts when one vote is worth much more than another. In Japan it's 3 times value for lower house and 6 times value for the upper; Britain is about 1, France 1.5, Germany 2 and Italy 1.22 (though the limit is broken sometimes). Some countries like the Netherlands and Israel has no electoral districts at all.
The United States House of Representatives is below 1.4 times but the Senate is over 70 times. Quite horrendous compared to other developed nations
The whole issue of state sovereignty is at hand, although Great Britain which has four parts have very low (almost no) disparity in the value of one vote. Votes in swing districts/states would also have a greater effect on the outcome of the election while votes in overly liberal/conservative/etc districts wouldn't "count" at all. The only fair way to do it is the Netherland/Israel way of having one national district and all votes going towards that one vote count. Would go a long way towards getting rid of pork-barrel spending (but would encourage demagogues/celebrities from running).