Electoral College is great, There should be a limit on the number of electors from a state before a state needs to split into two. California is insane, that monster needs to be split into three states.
The way that state votes, it might do well to find another way. Different parts of CA vote with the conservatives. They are just outmanned do to the rest of the state. imho
As a side note Ca would have been originaly 2 states but all the population was up north with the gold rush and new states were by default non-slave states.
The south would not have allowed it.
"There should be a limit on the number of electors from a state before a state needs to split into two."
Now THAT'S a reform worth discussing. Too bad the bien pensants at the Times couldn't think of it. I imagine there a lot of conservatives in Cali who wouldn't mind being in their own Semi-Cali state. For a variety of reasons.
Absolutely! And, think of the impacts on the Senate with four more Senators.
-PJ
The only way we should change the system, if at all, is to have an ever MORE federalist electoral college:
Instead of winner-take-all states, how about the following:
A victory in a single congressional district = 1 EV.
A victory statewide = 2 EV.
This would open up areas within states to political competition. For example, in California there is a large number of conservatives, but the state they're slightly outmnumbered by libs. Same goes for upstate NY, southern illinois, North Florida, Western Pennsylvania, and many other places.
I've heard a lot of conservatives propose this idea, and the common counterargument is a growth in gerrymandering. My response: so what!
If congressional district lines were more important, wouldn't that make who controls the state legislature more important? And if that were the case, wouldn't that in effect devolve power away from the Federal Government and back to the states???
It would bring us back closer to the days when control of the state legislature was more important than federal seats! That was before the 17th Amendment, when senators were appointed by the legislatures.
If this happened in the last election, Bush would have won by by more votes.
30 states voted for Bush, which would give him 60 EV from state-wide races (senatorial representation). Al Gore would have gotten 40 EV. If everybody voted according to their congressional district, Bush would have 228 EV from the Congressional EVs.
That's 288 EV for Bush, 250 EV for Gore. If democrats wanted to increase their electoral prospects, they would have to strengthen their appeal at the LOCAL level. No longer can a presidential candidate put a slick gloss on a campaign, bite their lip, promise to "feel their pain", and ride on positive media coverage. Support would have to be built from the ground up. The executive branch would be weak, like the constitution intended. States would have more power as well.
Thoughts???
"Electoral College is great, There should be a limit on the number of electors from a state before a state needs to split into two. California is insane, that monster needs to be split into three states."
-- There was actually a movement in Northern California to split off in the early 1990s. It was during the drought, and the heavily-populated Southern half of the state got the legislature to approve higher water prices and water rationing in the North, while Southern Californians had no such restrictions or even higher prices. The two halves of the state are very different. Even in SoCal there's a diofference politically. San Diego is considered a Republican city, while L.A. is teeming with liberals.
Totally agree. California, taken alone, would be the fifth largest economy in the world. I do not think the founders of this country intended for a single state to have this much power over the rest of the nation. Splitting it into three states makes perfect sense. Of course, Texas and New York would need to be split in two to keep it consistent. Florida is getting close to needing to be split in two.
The Electoral College is great. Otherwise, candidates would be forced to campaign only in big cities, totally ignoring rural areas and sparsely populated states.
California is insane, that monster needs to be split into three states.