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To: Norm Lenhart
State laws assign the majority vote to electors do they not?

The States can make any sorts of laws they wish to make concerning the persons they choose for the Electoral College so long as such laws are not in conflict with the Constitution. Here's what the Constitution says:

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.
Obviously, now this whole process has become a pro forma affair where the States hold elections for entire slates of elector whose names have been submitted by the political parties; and some State laws require that the electors so chosen must vote for candidate of the party that placed their name on the ballot. (When I was a kid in NY, the names of these elector nominees were there on the ballot. Here in NJ now our ballots just say "Electors for Jones.") The States could have their own laws that the candidates the electors are pledged to are Constitutionally eligible to be President. I believe NJ has such laws, which shows just how much good they do. (One of the minor party candidates here last time was born in Nicaragua. I think, and our glorious Secretary of State did nothing about this.) But none of these State laws has any application in a Federal Court so far as I know.

Serious question, not being a twit.

No need to apologize. No question is stupid the first time it is asked.

ML/NJ

21 posted on 06/20/2011 2:50:27 PM PDT by ml/nj
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To: charlene4

Ping! :)


22 posted on 06/20/2011 3:06:11 PM PDT by DiogenesLamp (Obama hides behind the Grass Skirts of Hawaiian Bureaucrats.)
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