COMMUNIST ORGANIZER
Posted on 09/06/2008 4:46:21 AM PDT by Billg64
Ha ha yeah that raises another question: how many electors do those 7 extra states have?
But he had to win a majority of the Electoral College votes. The same with George Bush and every other president. The electoral college system encourages fewer parties.
It also gives a voice to less populous states. Otherwise, they would always be ignored. As it is, their small number of electoral votes makes a big difference. In fact, they can be the deciding difference.
There is nothing in the Constitution mandating a popular vote.
Article II, Section 1:
Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.If the state legislature chose to, it could take the presidential election off the Nov 4 ballot entirely, and decide who the state's electoral vote goes to by legislation
I would hope the equal protection clause would protect the citizens from this type of scheme. In addition to that, everyone knows what the Constitution intended by the language describing how states shall choose their electors — and a change to that intent would require a new constitutional amendment.
I know in North Carolina the same bill has been introduced, but it has been tabled.
SB 954, sponsored by Senator Daniel Clodfelter (D-Mecklenburg) that would dilute North Carolina’s voting power in presidential elections. The legislation is currently being considered by the House and may be voted on during this session. In effect, SB 954 would realign North Carolina’s 15 electoral votes so they would no longer go to the person who actually wins North Carolina’s popular election. Instead, North Carolina’s votes would be given to the candidate who wins the national popular vote. If the General Assembly passes this bill, North Carolina electors would be required to vote in a manner that may be inconsistent with the will of North Carolina voters.
“I’m not sure I follow this.
Would this law make it theoretically possible for 100% of the state of Massachusetts to have voted for candidate x, but the state’s delegates be awarded to candidate y because 51% of the nation did?”
Yes, it would. Do you “follow it” now?
I know that the Constitution permits states to select electors for the Electoral College as they choose.
But - in cases where a majority in a given state clearly votes for candidate A, and the “law” in that states says that electors must vote for candidate B because he/she won a majority of votes in _other states_ - I believe such a law could be challenged in federal (and eventually the U.S. Supreme) court on the basis that it negates _another_ state obligation under the Constitution: that citizens of the states be guaranteed a “representative” form of government.
I’m just a dumb neanderthal, but seems to me that ANY law within a state which mandates that the votes of a majority of its citizens be negated would be in direct violation of the Constitution due to the “representative form of government” clause.
- John
That was my point in response to post #8. The states can allocate their electoral votes anyway they want, witness the systems used in Maine and Nebraska. The contstutional issue involved in this case are state compacts and the allocation of electoral votes. It has never been tested.
“Then why have states at all?”
Psssst! Don’t say that too loudly!
You’re getting dangerously close to their REAL agenda here.....!
- John
I really wonder why all this activity is happening in the state legislatures.
There must be a lot of swiss bank accounts changing hands!
Oh come now. Then BillyBob Clintoon wouldn’t have ascended the throne.
It’s only happening in Democrat-leaning legislatures in Democrat-leaning states.
These idiots are still fighting the battles of 2000.
It’s that simple. But in reality all they are doing is setting up the very real potential of regular electoral college shut-outs for the Republicans.
Since these laws go into effect as soon as enough states sign on as to represent a bare majority of the electoral college, and since it is only Democrat-leaning states doing it, we would likely see it only have an effect in years where Republicans win, and all the states that were carried by the Democrat would be forced to vote for the Republican. Since Republican-leaning states won’t be signing on, no red states would turn blue in the case of a Democrat win, keeping the electoral vote totals close.
And here’s the best part: imagine all the blue states plus one or two swing states sign on to reach 270 electoral votes, but as populations continue to change, several blue states lose electoral votes while several red states gain electoral votes, as has been happening steadily and is projected to continue. Suddenly, we may find a situation where these laws were activated in all of these blue states, but there are no longer enough combined electoral votes in them all to guarantee the election to the popular vote winner.
.... and no one would have heard of Hillary ....
But one outcome of the Supreme Court decision in Bush v Gore, over the Florida recount mess, is that the state may NOT change the rules after the election
Just like everything else backfires on the idiot commies.
Like they’re forcing the “special prosecutor” on the system for investigation.
It came back on Klintoon, and boy were the commies railing against the system THEY insisted on.
There is another example, but right now I can’t remember it. Perhaps someone else can.
The Bush-Gore SCOTUS ruling is not relevant to this issue as you can plainly see.,
I don't think it is healthy for either party to ignore the out of play states. I think part of the national balkanization is due to this fact.
The problem is that this approach would either have to be formalized in the Constitution or all 50 states would have to adopt the approach (very unlikely unless you get traditionally red and blue states to do it together).
I think that I would prefer a Constitutional amendment that would also get away from the concept of electors (some day a faithless elector is going to make a difference and then watch out). The amendment could also formalize succession issues (such as if the President and/or the Vice President elect getting killed before swearing in).
Thanks, got it.
That’s insane.
Why change the Constitution to remove electors? It is part of federalism and the right of states to decide how they will cast their electoral votes? The objective of this group is the direct election of the President and VP by popular vote. They have developed this Rube Goldberg system to circumvent the Constitution, i.e., they keep the electoral college in place but they use state compacts to allocate the electoral votes based on the national popular vote.
The state legislatures and the governor decide how to allocate the electoral votes, so it is representative. Four states have already signed on to this compact and four more states, including CA, have had both houses sign off on it.
National Popular Vote They seem to believe it will pass constitutional muster. It is really an end run around the Constitution to implement the direct election of the President by popular vote. It will undermine even futher federalism and marginalize the smaller states.
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