tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post7126453222771842068..comments2024-03-15T00:14:33.424-07:00Comments on Fred's Blog: The Possibility of an Imperial Democrat PartyFred Henstridgehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00996638839052804656noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post-58813944031303615442011-08-01T10:16:47.669-07:002011-08-01T10:16:47.669-07:00National Popular Vote is a nonpartisan coalition ...National Popular Vote is a nonpartisan coalition of legislators, scholars, constitutionalists and grassroots activists committed to preserving the Electoral College, while guaranteeing the presidency to the candidate who earns the most votes in all 50 states.<br /><br />The National Advisory Board of NPV includes former Senators Jake Garn (R–UT), Birch Bayh (D–IN), and David Durenberger (R–MN) as well as former congressmen John Anderson (R–IL, I), John Buchanan (R–AL), Tom Campbell (R–CA), and Tom Downey (D–NY). <br /><br />Jason Cabel Roe, a lifelong conservative activist and professional political consultant wrote:<br />"I strongly support National Popular Vote. It is good for Republicans, it is good for conservatives, it is good for California, and it is good for America. National Popular Vote is not a grand conspiracy hatched by the Left to manipulate the election outcome. <br />It is a bipartisan effort of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents to allow every state – and every voter – to have a say in the selection of our President, and not just the 15 Battle Ground States.<br /><br />National Popular Vote is not a change that can be easily explained, nor the ramifications thought through in sound bites. It takes a keen political mind to understand just how much it can help . . . Republicans. . . .Opponents either have a knee-jerk reaction to the idea or don’t fully understand it. . . . We believe that the more exposure and discussion the reform has the more support that will build for it."<br /><br />Former Tennessee U.S. Senator and 2008 presidential candidate Fred Thompson (R), and former Illinois Governor Jim Edgar (R) are co-champions of NPV.<br /><br />Saul Anuzis, Chairman of the Michigan Republican Party for 5 years and a former candidate for chairman of the RNC, supports NPV as the fairest way to make sure every vote matters. "This is not a partisan issue and the NPV plan would not help either party over the other." <br /><br />Some other not liberal supporters who wrote forewords to "Every Vote Equal: A State-Based Plan for Electing the President by National Popular Vote " include:<br /><br />Laura Brod - Minnesota Public Sector Chair for ALEC.<br /><br />James Brulte - Republican Leader of the California State Assembly from 1992 to 1996, and Senate Republican leader from 2000 to 2004.<br /><br />Ray Haynes - National Chairman of ALEC in 2000. <br /><br />New York Assemblyman Dean Murray - a Tea Party organizer before being elected to the Assembly as a Republican, Conservative Party member. Fox News described him as the first Tea Party candidate elected to office in the U.S.<br /><br />Thomas Pearce - Michigan State Representative from 2005–2010 and appointed Dean of the Republican Caucus. <br /><br />**<br /><br />On June 7, 2011, the Republican-controlled New York Senate passed the National Popular Vote bill by a 47–13 margin, with Republicans favoring the bill by 21–11. Republicans endorsed by the Conservative Party favored the bill 17–7.<br /><br />**<br /><br />In 1969, The U.S. House of Representatives voted for a national popular vote by a 338–70 margin. It was endorsed by Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, George H.W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, and contemporary vice-presidential candidates Bob Dole and Walter Mondale.totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post-71084535326997092252011-08-01T10:13:23.766-07:002011-08-01T10:13:23.766-07:002,110 state legislators (in 50 states) have sponso...2,110 state legislators (in 50 states) have sponsored and/or cast recorded votes in favor of the bill. <br /><br />In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). The recent Washington Post, Kaiser Family Foundation, and Harvard University poll shows 72% support for direct nationwide election of the President. Support is strong among Republican voters, Democratic voters, and independent voters, as well as every demographic group surveyed in virtually every state surveyed in recent polls in closely divided battleground states: Colorado-- 68%, Florida – 78%, Iowa --75%, Michigan-- 73%, Missouri-- 70%, New Hampshire-- 69%, Nevada-- 72%, New Mexico-- 76%, North Carolina-- 74%, Ohio-- 70%, Pennsylvania -- 78%, Virginia -- 74%, and Wisconsin -- 71%; in smaller states (3 to 5 electoral votes): Alaska -- 70%, DC -- 76%, Delaware --75%, Idaho – 77%, Maine -- 77%, Montana – 72%, Nebraska -- 74%, New Hampshire --69%, Nevada -- 72%, New Mexico -- 76%, Oklahoma – 81%, Rhode Island -- 74%, South Dakota – 71%, Utah - 70%, Vermont -- 75%, and West Virginia – 81%, and Wyoming – 69%; in Southern and border states: Arkansas --80%, Kentucky -- 80%, Mississippi --77%, Missouri -- 70%, North Carolina -- 74%, Oklahoma – 81%, South Carolina – 71%, Tennessee -- 83%, Virginia -- 74%, and West Virginia – 81%; and in other states polled: California -- 70%, Connecticut -- 74%,, Massachusetts -- 73%, Minnesota -- 75%, New York -- 79%, Oregon – 76%, and Washington -- 77%. <br /> <br />Most voters don't care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state . . . they care whether he/she wins the White House. Voters want to know, that even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was directly and equally counted and mattered to their candidate. Most Americans consider the idea of the candidate with the most popular votes being declared a loser detestable. We don't allow this in any other election in our representative republic.<br /> <br />The National Popular Vote bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers, in 21 small, medium-small, medium, and large population states, including one house in Arkansas(6), Connecticut (7), Delaware (3), The District of Columbia, Maine (4), Michigan (16), Nevada (5), New Mexico (5), New York (29), North Carolina (15), and Oregon (7), and both houses in California (55), Colorado (9), Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island (4), Vermont, and Washington. The bill has been enacted by the District of Columbia (3), Hawaii (4), Illinois (19), New Jersey (14), Maryland (11), Massachusetts (10), Vermont (3), and Washington (13). These eight jurisdictions have 77 electoral votes -- 29% of the 270 necessary to bring the law into effect.<br /><br />See http://www.NationalPopularVote.comtotohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post-57905535131620059602011-08-01T10:12:50.923-07:002011-08-01T10:12:50.923-07:00The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the...The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC). <br /> <br />The bill is a state-based approach. It preserves the Electoral College and state control of elections. It changes the way electoral votes are awarded in the Electoral College. It assures that every vote is equal and that every voter will matter in every state in every presidential election, as in virtually every other election in the country. <br /><br />Under National Popular Vote, every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections, and included in the national count that determines the candidate with the most popular votes, who then is guaranteed the majority of electoral votes needed to win the presidency. It gives a voice to the minority party voters in each state. Now their votes are counted only for the candidate they did not vote for. Every vote, everywhere would be counted for and directly assist the candidate for whom it was cast. Candidates would need to care about voters across the nation, not just undecided voters in a handful of swing states. <br /> <br />In the 2012 election, pundits and campaign operatives already agree that, only 7-14 states and their voters will matter under the current winner-take-all laws (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in each state) used by 48 of the 50 states. Candidates will not care about at least 72% of the voters-- voters in 19 of the 22 lowest population and medium-small states, and in 16 medium and big states like CA, GA, NY, and TX. 2012 campaigning would be even more obscenely exclusive than 2008 and 2004. In 2008, candidates concentrated over 2/3rds of their campaign events and ad money in just 6 states, and 98% in just 15 states (CO, FL, IN, IA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NH, NM, NC, OH, PA, VA, and WI). Over half (57%) of the events were in just 4 states (OH, FL, PA, and VA). Candidates have no reason to poll, visit, advertise, organize, campaign, or care about the voter concerns in the dozens of states where they are safely ahead or hopelessly behind. <br /><br />Now, policies important to the citizens of ‘flyover’ states are not as highly prioritized as policies important to ‘battleground’ states when it comes to governing, too.<br /><br />Charlie Cook reported in 2004: <br />“Senior Bush campaign strategist Matthew Dowd pointed out yesterday that the Bush campaign hadn’t taken a national poll in almost two years; instead, it has been polling 18 battleground states.”<br /><br />Since World War II, a shift of only a few thousand votes in one or two states would have elected the second-place candidate in 4 of the 13 presidential elections. Near misses are now frequently common. There have been 6 consecutive non-landslide presidential elections. A shift of 60,000 voters in Ohio in 2004 would have defeated President Bush despite his nationwide lead of over 3 Million votes. Some insider Republicans believe under the current system in 2012, President Obama could win the electoral vote without winning the popular vote.<br /><br />The Electoral College that we have today was not designed, anticipated, or favored by the Founding Fathers but, instead, is the product of decades of evolutionary change precipitated by the emergence of political parties and enactment by 48 states of winner-take-all laws, not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Constitution.<br /><br />States have the responsibility to make their voters relevant in every presidential election. The bill uses the power given to each state by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution to change how they award their electoral votes for president. It does not abolish the Electoral College. Historically, virtually all of the major changes in the method of electing the President, including ending the requirement that only men who owned substantial property could vote and 48 current state-by-state winner-take-all laws, have come about by state legislative action, without federal constitutional amendments.totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post-12588468412560916212011-08-01T10:06:49.079-07:002011-08-01T10:06:49.079-07:00Congressional consent is not required for the Nati...Congressional consent is not required for the National Popular Vote compact under prevailing U.S. Supreme Court rulings. However, because there would undoubtedly be time-consuming litigation about this aspect of the compact, National Popular Vote is working to introduce a bill in Congress for congressional consent.<br /><br />The U.S. Constitution provides:<br /><br />"No state shall, without the consent of Congress,… enter into any agreement or compact with another state…."<br /><br />Although this language may seem straight forward, the U.S. Supreme Court has method, in 1893 and again in 1978, that the Compacts Clause can "not be read literally." In deciding the 1978 case of U.S. Steel Corporation v. Multistate Tax Commission, the Court wrote:<br /><br />"Read literally, the Compact Clause would require the States to obtain congressional approval before entering into any agreement among themselves, irrespective of form, subject, duration, or interest to the United States.<br /><br />"The difficulties with such an interpretation were identified by Mr. Justice Field in his opinion for the Court in [the 1893 case] Virginia v. Tennessee. His conclusion [was] that the Clause could not be read literally [and this 1893 conclusion has been] approved in subsequent dicta."<br /><br />Specifically, the Court's 1893 ruling in Virginia v. Tennessee stated:<br /><br />"Looking at the clause in which the terms 'compact' or 'agreement' appear, it is evident that the prohibition is directed to the formation of any combination tending to the increase of political power in the states, which may encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States."<br /><br />The state power involved in the National Popular Vote compact is specified in Article II, Section 1, Clause 2 the U.S. Constitution:<br /><br />"Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors…."<br /><br />In the 1892 case of McPherson v. Blacker (146 U.S. 1), the Court wrote:<br /><br />"The appointment and mode of appointment of electors belong exclusively to the states under the constitution of the United States"<br /><br />The National Popular Vote compact would not "encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States" because there is simply no federal power -- much less federal supremacy -- in the area of awarding of electoral votes in the first place.<br /><br /><br />Any attempt by a state to pull out of the compact in violation of its terms would violate the Impairments Clause of the U.S. Constitution and would be void. Such an attempt would also violate existing federal law. Compliance would be enforced by Federal court action <br /><br />The bill says: "Any member state may withdraw from this agreement, except that a withdrawal occurring six months or less before the end of a President’s term shall not become effective until a President or Vice President shall have been qualified to serve the next term."<br /><br />The National Popular Vote compact is, first of all, a state law. It is a state law that would govern the manner of choosing presidential electors. A Secretary of State may not ignore or override the National Popular Vote law any more than he or she may ignore or override the winner-take-all method that is currently the law in 48 states. <br /><br />There has never been a court decision allowing a state to withdraw from an interstate compact without following the procedure for withdrawal specified by the compact. Indeed, courts have consistently rebuffed the occasional (sometimes creative) attempts by states to evade their obligations under interstate compacts.totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post-30875554448476838872011-08-01T10:04:52.431-07:002011-08-01T10:04:52.431-07:00The presidential election system we have today is ...The presidential election system we have today is not in the Constitution. State-by-state winner-take-all laws to award Electoral College votes, are an example of state laws eventually enacted by states, using their exclusive power to do so, AFTER the Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution, Now our current system can be changed by state laws again.<br /> <br />Unable to agree on any particular method, the Founding Fathers left the choice of method for selecting presidential electors exclusively to the states by adopting the language contained in section 1 of Article II of the U.S. Constitution-- "Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors . . ." The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly characterized the authority of the state legislatures over the manner of awarding their electoral votes as "plenary" and "exclusive."<br /><br />The constitution does not prohibit any of the methods that were debated and rejected. Indeed, a majority of the states appointed their presidential electors using two of the rejected methods in the nation's first presidential election in 1789 (i.e., appointment by the legislature and by the governor and his cabinet). Presidential electors were appointed by state legislatures for almost a century. <br /> <br />Neither of the two most important features of the current system of electing the President (namely, universal suffrage, and the 48 state-by-state winner-take-all method) are in the U.S. Constitution. Neither was the choice of the Founders when they went back to their states to organize the nation's first presidential election.<br /><br />In 1789, in the nation's first election, the people had no vote for President in most states, only men who owned a substantial amount of property could vote, and only three states used the state-by-state winner-take-all method to award electoral votes.<br /><br />The current 48 state-by-state winner-take-all method (i.e., awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in a particular state) is not entitled to any special deference based on history or the historical meaning of the words in the U.S. Constitution. It is not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, the debates of the Constitutional Convention, or the Federalist Papers. The actions taken by the Founding Fathers make it clear that they never gave their imprimatur to the winner-take-all method.<br /><br />The constitutional wording does not encourage, discourage, require, or prohibit the use of any particular method for awarding the state's electoral votes.<br /><br />As a result of changes in state laws enacted since 1789, the people have the right to vote for presidential electors in 100% of the states, there are no property requirements for voting in any state, and the state-by-state winner-take-all method is used by 48 of the 50 states. States can, and frequently have, changed their method of awarding electoral votes over the years.totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post-31778682433782898682011-08-01T10:02:36.996-07:002011-08-01T10:02:36.996-07:00Current federal law (Title 3, chapter 1, section 6...Current federal law (Title 3, chapter 1, section 6 of the United States Code) requires the states to report the November popular vote numbers (the "canvas") in what is called a "Certificate of Ascertainment." You can see the Certificates of Ascertainment for all 50 states and the District of Columbia containing the official count of the popular vote at the NARA web site at <br />http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/2008/certificates-of-ascertainment.htmltotohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post-71856359920323223922011-08-01T10:01:06.706-07:002011-08-01T10:01:06.706-07:00The 2000 presidential election was an artificial c...The 2000 presidential election was an artificial crisis created because of Bush's lead of 537 popular votes in Florida. Gore's nationwide lead was 537,179 popular votes (1,000 times larger). Given the miniscule number of votes that are changed by a typical statewide recount (averaging only 274 votes), no one would have requested a recount or disputed the results in 2000 if the national popular vote had controlled the outcome. Indeed, no one (except perhaps almanac writers and trivia buffs) would have cared that one of the candidates happened to have a 537-vote margin in Florida. <br /><br />The common nationwide date for meeting of the Electoral College has been set by federal law as the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December. Under both the current system and the National Popular Vote approach, all counting, recounting, and judicial proceedings must be conducted so as to reach a "final determination" prior to the meeting of the Electoral College. In particular, the U.S. Supreme Court has made it clear that the states are expected to make their "final determination" six days before the Electoral College meets.totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1765803836831192627.post-9209459572175339072011-08-01T09:59:40.049-07:002011-08-01T09:59:40.049-07:00The current system maximizes the incentive and opp...The current system maximizes the incentive and opportunity for fraud. A very few people can change the national outcome by changing a small number of votes in one closely divided battleground state. The sheer magnitude of the national popular vote number is much more robust against manipulation.<br /><br />Senator Birch Bayh (D-Indiana) summed up the concerns about possible fraud in a nationwide popular election for President in a Senate speech by saying in 1979, "one of the things we can do to limit fraud is to limit the benefits to be gained by fraud. Under a direct popular vote system, one fraudulent vote wins one vote in the return. In the electoral college system, one fraudulent vote could mean 45 electoral votes, 28 electoral votes." <br /><br />Hendrik Hertzberg wrote: "To steal the closest popular-vote election in American history, you'd have to steal more than a hundred thousand votes . . .To steal the closest electoral-vote election in American history, you'd have to steal around 500 votes, all in one state. . . . <br /><br />For a national popular vote election to be as easy to switch as 2000, it would have to be two hundred times closer than the 1960 election--and, in popular-vote terms, forty times closer than 2000 itself. <br /><br />Which, I ask you, is an easier mark for vote-stealers, the status quo or N.P.V.[National Popular Vote]? Which offers thieves a better shot at success for a smaller effort?"<br /><br />**<br /><br />Recounts are far more likely in the current system of state-by-state winner-take-all methods.<br /><br />The possibility of recounts should not even be a consideration in debating the merits of a national popular vote. No one has ever suggested that the possibility of a recount constitutes a valid reason why state governors or U.S. Senators, for example, should not be elected by a popular vote. <br /><br />The question of recounts comes to mind in connection with presidential elections only because the current system so frequently creates artificial crises and unnecessary disputes. <br /><br />A nationwide recount would not happen. We do and would vote state by state. Each state manages its own election and recount. The state-by-state winner-take-all system is not a firewall, but instead causes unnecessary fires.<br /><br />Given that there is a recount only once in about 160 statewide elections, and given there is a presidential election once every four years, one would expect a recount about once in 640 years under the National Popular Vote approach. The actual probability of a close national election would be even less than that because recounts are less likely with larger pools of votes. <br /><br />The average change in the margin of victory as a result of a statewide recount was a mere 296 votes in a 10-year study of 2,884 elections. <br /><br />No recount would have been warranted in any of the nation’s 56 previous presidential elections if the outcome had been based on the nationwide count.totohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12247335901450384827noreply@blogger.com