[EL] The Electoral College & NPV
Jboppjr
jboppjr at aol.com
Wed Aug 29 14:10:11 PDT 2012
Since I do not underestimate the creativity and inventiveness of those who want to gut rip the Electoral College, we wanted to make sure that we did not miss anything. As to voting by congressional district and to binding electors, I see no problem here. In fact, I helped write the Uniform Law Commission's uniform law binding electors. Jim Bopp
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy Note™, an AT&T LTE smartphone
-------- Original message --------
Subject: Re: [EL] The Electoral College & NPV
From: Rob Richie <rr at fairvote.org>
To: Jboppjr <jboppjr at aol.com>
CC: Re: [EL] The Electoral College & NPV
The full GOP platform statement (below) is quite revealing. Here's the line that jumps out to me: NPV is "a guarantee of corruption as every ballot box in every state would become a chance to steal the presidency."
The logic of that concern is basically "when every vote counts, there's more chances for fraud." Jonathan Swift might suggest that rather than reduce 50-state elections to fewer than ten under the current rules, we could take it further -- maybe just reduce meaningful voting to one state in which we could try to prevent fraud and just let those voter decide for the rest of us. Heck, we could just let the Dixville Notch folks in New Hampshire make the choice every four years sitting around a wood stove.
But I did have a serious question for Jim. What does it meant to oppose "any other scheme to abolish or distort the procedures of the Electoral College." Does "distort the procedures" mean the GOP is now against Pennsylvania trying to change the winner-take-all rule to congressional district allocation? Does it mean changes to rules involving faithless electors? Something else? I wasn't sure.
Thanks,
Rob
######
FULL GOP PLATFORM STATEMENT:
We oppose the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact or any other scheme to abolish or distort the procedures of the Electoral College. We recognize that an unconstitutional effort to impose “national popular vote” would be a mortal threat to our federal system and a guarantee of corruption as every ballot box in every state would become a chance to steal the presidency.
On Wed, Aug 29, 2012 at 3:36 PM, Jboppjr <jboppjr at aol.com> wrote:
For those who are interested the Republican National platform specifically opposes the National Popular Vote Initiative. Jim Bopp
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy Note™, an AT&T LTE smartphone
-------- Original message --------
Subject: Re: [EL] The Electoral College & NPV
From: Rob Richie <rr at fairvote.org>
To: Tara Ross <tara at taraross.com>
CC: Re: [EL] The Electoral College & NPV
Congratulations on your updated book, Tara -- I look forward to chances to discuss the issue with you this fall.
To clarify on one point, you write: "Even for those who wish to do away with the Electoral College, a constitutional amendment is a far better route toward change."
A constitutional amendment of course is required "to do away with the Electoral College" in any form. But to do away with states using the winner-take-all rule (a rule that founders like James Madison lamented as getting away from their vision), it simply takes a state law. State laws historically have been the means to change much involving selection of the president, including the very fact of having elections at all - -a change that back in 1812, perhaps, someone might have argued should best be done by constitutional amendment.
I should note that while backers of a national popular vote for president seem able to unify behind the national popular vote for president, I suspect they right now would not unify in backing a constitutional amendment. Some backers of NPV want to keep power over presidential selection with the states, and would oppose any amendment mandating direct election. Some backers of a direct election amendment would like to see a plurality vote rule for president, while others would prefer a runoff or instant runoff system. Some backers of direct election would like to have a strong unitary election administration, others would like to see continuation of the decentralized approach to election administration that was part of the amendment drives a generation ago.
Given that you clearly prefer the current rules to a national popular vote president, I'm surprised you would rather see a national popular vote enshrined in the Constitution rather than the product of state laws that much more easily could be changed in the future.
Rob
On Wed, Aug 29, 2012 at 12:30 PM, Tara Ross <tara at taraross.com> wrote:
In a little bit of shameless self-promotion, I thought this listserv might be interested to know that the 2nd edition of my book, Enlightened Democracy: The Case for the Electoral College will be released on September 3. Yes, I am sorry to say that, back in January when the release date was being set, none of us clued in that September 3 is Labor Day. :) The Amazon link is here: www.EnlightenedDemocracy.com
I am sure that Rob Richie, John Koza and others are very excited to receive this email and will have rave reviews of the book coming soon……Ha! Yes, I am kidding!
On a serious note, I hope the three new chapters in the book do a fair job of articulating the philosophical, logistical, and legal concerns that some of us have with NPV’s legislation. Even for those who wish to do away with the Electoral College, a constitutional amendment is a far better route toward change.
I am sorry to miss several of you at the NPV panel in New Orleans this weekend. It would have been a good discussion, I don’t doubt.
Happy Labor Day!
Tara
============
Tara Ross
8409 Pickwick Ln, #280
Dallas, Texas 75225
(214) 750-4737
(214) 750-4633 (fax)
tara at taraross.com
web / Facebook / Twitter
_______________________________________________
Law-election mailing list
Law-election at department-lists.uci.edu
http://department-lists.uci.edu/mailman/listinfo/law-election
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Respect for Every Vote and Every Voice"
Rob Richie
Executive Director
FairVote
6930 Carroll Avenue, Suite 610
Takoma Park, MD 20912
www.fairvote.org rr at fairvote.org
(301) 270-4616
Please support FairVote through action and tax-deductible donations -- see http://fairvote.org/donate. For federal employees, please consider a gift to us through the Combined Federal Campaign (FairVote's CFC number is 10132.) Thank you!
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Respect for Every Vote and Every Voice"
Rob Richie
Executive Director
FairVote
6930 Carroll Avenue, Suite 610
Takoma Park, MD 20912
www.fairvote.org rr at fairvote.org
(301) 270-4616
Please support FairVote through action and tax-deductible donations -- see http://fairvote.org/donate. For federal employees, please consider a gift to us through the Combined Federal Campaign (FairVote's CFC number is 10132.) Thank you!
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://webshare.law.ucla.edu/Listservs/law-election/attachments/20120829/6cd3e1ac/attachment.html>
View list directory