[EL] Check out Could Pennsylvania Republicans end the electoral college a...

Thu Sep 15 10:17:25 PDT 2011

      As is often the case when the electoral college is in question, this discussion seems to me to be out of touch with reality.  The prospect raised by the Pennsylvania proposal is not that we might move to a system in which each state allocates its electors by congressional district.  States that are likely to support a party's presidential candidate and whose state governments are controlled by the same party--states such as California, Illinois, New York, Texas--will not consider the Pennsylvania proposal.  To do so would simply be to hand over electoral votes to the opposition.

       The proposal would be of possible political value to a state in which the state government is controlled by the party whose presidential candidate is likely to lose in that state.  A state, that is, like Pennsylvania.  Pennsylvania has gone Democratic in the last several presidential elections.  If it does so again in 2012, then by changing to a congressional-district system, the Republicans could pick up several electoral votes that would otherwise go to Obama.  If the electoral vote is close, those extra votes could possibly prove decisive.

        True, the Republicans have a chance to win Pennsylvania next year, a possibility highlighted by Turner's strong showing among voters generally and especially among Jewish voters in NY 9 (though my understanding is that Republican gains among Jews were mostly among Orthodox Jews, and I'm guessing that the proportion of Jews in Pennsylvania who are Orthodox is small).  That possibility may make it less likely that Pennsylvania will adopt this proposal.  But the Republicans could figure that if they are strong enough in 2012 to win Pennsylvania, their candidate will probably win the election regardless of Pennsylvania.  In that case, losing some electoral votes in the event they win the state is much less important than the gain of some electoral votes if they lose the state.

         Whatever the specific calculus in Pennsylvania this year, the number of states in which any such calculus will be relevant in any given year is going to be small.  But not insignificant, especially in a presidential election following a wave election such as occurred in 2006 and 2010.  I hope the Republicans will abandon this idea, though it might help them in the short run to adopt it not only in Pennsylvania but perhaps other states such as Wisconsin.  Though I strongly respect the right of each state to determine how it (not a national electorate) will appoint its electors, still the country is probably better off with a largely uniform system.  We have developed such a system because states have thought of their self-interest in magnifying their own voices as states rather than maximizing the benefit for the party that happens to control the state government going into a presidential election.  It's better when the rules are not being changed for short-term partisan advantage and its better, as Michael McDonald suggested, when state politics are not unduly influenced by national considerations.

             Best,

             Daniel H. Lowenstein
             Director, Center for the Liberal Arts and Free Institutions (CLAFI)
             UCLA Law School
             405 Hilgard
             Los Angeles, California 90095-1476
             310-825-5148

________________________________
From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Tom Brunell [tlb056000 at utdallas.edu]
Sent: Thursday, September 15, 2011 7:59 AM
To: Rob Richie
Cc: JBoppjr at aol.com; ABonin at cozen.com; law-election at uci.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] Check out Could Pennsylvania Republicans end the electoral college a...

I quickly read FairVote's report and I think the problem with the conclusions rests on the basis of their comparison - rather than comparing the congressional district system to a national popular vote, shouldn't you be comparing it to the status quo?  The report does show, I think, that the congressional district system comes closer to the national popular vote that the winner-take-all method we have in most states now.
A quote from page 10:

"In 1972, Nixon won a landslide victory over George McGovern. His popular vote lead was 23.15 percent, which translated into an Electoral College lead of 93.5 percent. Under the congressional district system, his Electoral College lead would have been at 77.7 percent – smaller than with the unit rule allocation, but still considerably inflated compared to the popular vote difference."

Not surprisingly the congressional district system is far more proportional (fair?) than the winner-take-all method.  This is the rationale for having districts in the first place - the results are much closer to proportional than winner take all.  I understand that Rob's preference is for NPV, but assuming we don't get that would this be a move in the right direction?

If the Republicans do better in a congressional district system relative to the status quo, I don't think we conclude that the system is biased in favor of the GOP, but rather that it is removing some of the pro-Democratic bias in the winner-take-all system.  This, it turns out, is correct.  Below is a table showing that Democrats are advantaged in the Electoral College because they win far more EC votes by narrower margins that the Republicans do.  Their votes are being used more efficiently and this is the source of the bias.

Would it be fair if only Blue states switched to this and Red states did not?  No, but still the congressional district system is a move toward more proportional results.

Number of Electoral College Votes by Party and Winning Margin, 1996-2004

1996

2000

2004

2008

Margin

Dem

Rep

Dem

Rep

Dem

Rep

Dem

Rep

0-5%

100

133

96

125

106

103

106

53

10-15

208

3

119

71

124

79

105

83

15-20

19

23

45

55

19

80

143

27

15-20

49

0

4

8

0

16

3

10

20-30

0

0

0

12

0

8

4

0

30-40

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

40-50

3

0

3

0

3

0

3

0

*Entries are the number of Electoral College votes won by each party in the last three presidential elections.  The far left column indicates the margin of victory in these states.  So the row label (0-5 %) indicates those states that the Democrat or Republican candidate carried by less than 5 percent of the two party vote.

Tom Brunell, Ph.D.
Professor of Political Science
Senior Associate Dean of Graduate Education
School of Economic, Political and Policy Science
UT Dallas
800 W. Campbell Road
Richardson, TX 75080
(972) 883-4963

On Sep 15, 2011, at 9:07 AM, Rob Richie wrote:

Jim, et al,

Let me preface my comment with a query. You were a leader in the push at the RNC to oppose the National Popular Vote plan for president. Do you see this proposal as an alternative the party should embrace even though it increases the odds of the national popular vote winner losing the election?

I'll comment on both the national implications of this misguided proposal and the state implications.

On the national implications: As Adam points out, if the congressional district proposal were done nationally, it would have a decided Republican tilt. Any presidential election in which a Democratic presidential candidate won the national popular vote by less than about 3% would typically be won by the Republican nominee. So rather than the "fair fight"that the national popular vote represents (both parties have demonstrated an equal ability to win the national popular vote over the years and ability to win by landslide in good years for their party), it would be an election system in which a Democrat could only win if winning by more than 3%.

FairVote did a useful report on the congressional dsitrict proposal back in 2007, calling it appropriately "Fuzzy Math." See:
http://www.fairvote.org/fuzzy-math-wrong-way-reforms-for-allocating-electoral-college-votes

Among findings:

* In 2004, only 55 congressional districts were decided by less than 4% in the presidential race. It's hard for campaign activity to affect much more than a couple percentage points, especially if the other side responds. If done nationally, very few districts would be competitive, and very few states would continue to be competitive. Most voters would remain as spectators.

* The 2000 election distortion cited by Adam is instructive of the Republican advantage in congressional districts today (an advantage I suspect will grow after this year's redistricting). But even in 1976, when Democrats like Jimmy Carter did better among white rural voters in the South, Carter's win by more than 2% in the national popular vote would have turned into a nail-biting 270-268 electoral vote win under the congressional district system.

As to the query about how greater concentration of Democratic votes matters, here are two revealing stats coming out of North Carolina.

* Using a state partisan voting index developed by Civitas that is similar to the Cook Partisan Voting Index, the median district in the new North Carolina house plan has a +6 Republican partisanship, up from +2 Republican in the Democratic plan that was used in 2010. Note that in that 2010 election, not a single Democrat won in any state legislative district with a Republican lean. And despite Republicans having a very good year, they did not win a single district with a lean of more than +4 Democratic.

* Obama won North Carolina in 2008. But in the new congressional district plan, 10 of 13 districts have a partisanship of at least +9 Republican - -meaning that a Republican candidate will likely carry 10 of the state's 13 House districts even if losing the statewide popular vote by 17%.

Relating to Pennsylvania specifically: The only rational way to interpret the Pennsylvania proposal is as a partisan powergrab designed to give a Republican nominee a majority of the state's electoral votes even when losing the statewide popular vote. Republicans are expected to try to cushion most, if not all, of their 12 House incumbents. So let's say the Republicans decide to sacrifice one incumbent and protect 11 seats. Just as the North Carolina GOP did, they will do so by packing Democrats into safe districts -- let's conservatively say 7, although they may go for just 6. If it's 7 seats, then the Republicans will win 11 of the state's 20 electoral votes even if losing the statewide popular vote by several percentage points.

Furthermore, it would be highly unlikely that more than two or three of the state's districts would be competitive. So a state that drew such massive attention in 2004 and 2008 would likely be effectively written off: why would a campaign fight hard for 2 statewide electoral votes or 1 or 2 congressional district electoral votes if all of the electoral votes in states like Ohio and Florida are in play due to winner-take-all?

So if I'm a Republican leader in Pennsylvania, I'm saying to the prospective Republican nominee: "forget about our state's voters -- just accept 11 electoral votes and go spend your money and your attention to voters elsewhere:"

Is this truly what they want? Can they justify it to their state's voters?

We'll see. But I would like to hear the opinions of the ardent opponents of the eminently fair national popular vote plan for president about whether this is their vision of a fair presidential election system.

- Rob Richie, FairVote

On Thu, Sep 15, 2011 at 8:58 AM, <JBoppjr at aol.com<mailto:JBoppjr at aol.com>> wrote:
    Very interesting.  If course, if this change was made, it would also change how campaigns are run.  In 2008, Obama made a successful play for one of Nebraska's electoral votes. I assume that changes in campaign strategy would mitigate this result in the future.  Jim Bopp

In a message dated 9/15/2011 8:34:55 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, ABonin at cozen.com<mailto:ABonin at cozen.com> writes:
Yes.  http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/09/14/1016892/-Pennsylvania-Republicans-propose-awarding-states-electoral-votes-by-congressional-district

Put simply, awarding electoral votes by congressional district would be a disaster for Democrats. Democratic voters tend to be much more concentrated in urban areas while Republican voters are typically more spread out. That means that the average blue seat is much bluer than the average red seat is red, which in turn means that there are more Republican-leaning districts than Democratic-inclined CDs.

Here's one stark illustration. John McCain's best district in the nation was TX-13, which occupies the Texas panhandle. He won there by 77-23, a 54 percent margin. By contrast, there were 39 districts that Barack Obama won by an equal or bigger spread, all the way up to his90-point victory in New York's 16th Congressional District in the South Bronx.

More concretely, if Pennsylvania's proposed system were in place nationwide, Obama's 365-173 electoral college romp would have been a much tighter 301-237 win. Meanwhile, George W. Bush's narrow 286-251 victory over John Kerry would have turned into a 317-221 blowout. And just as bad, Bush's razor-thin 271-266 margin over Al Gore would have been a more comfortable 288-250 spread for Dubya, making Gore's "loss" despite winning the national popular vote even more galling.

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu>] On Behalf Of JBoppjr at aol.com<mailto:JBoppjr at aol.com>
Sent: Thursday, September 15, 2011 8:32 AM
To: rhasen at law.uci.edu<mailto:rhasen at law.uci.edu>; law-election at uci.edu<mailto:law-election at uci.edu>
Subject: [EL] Check out Could Pennsylvania Republicans end the electoral college as we know

Click here: Could Pennsylvania Republicans end the electoral college as we know it? - The Washington Post<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/could-pennsylvania-republicans-end-the-electoral-college-as-we-know-it/2011/09/14/gIQAQUzUSK_blog.html>

Has anyone done any work on the effect of awarding electoral college votes by congressional district would have effected prior Presidential election results?  Jim Bopp
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