Why not award the presidency to the popular vote winner?

[Muse]

I woke up this morning with this idea. Seems to me it would help clean up the rancorous POTUS election process. It would make a lot of people feel relevant again. It would help eliminate a lot of the nutty maneuvering that goes on.

I Googled and found a very interesting idea:

There's been a movement for around 10 years to do an end run around a constitutional ammendment to make this happen by getting 270 electoral votes worth of states to sign onto the idea that they'd award all their electoral votes to the popular vote winner of presidential candidates.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...5/the-national-popular-vote-effort-explained/

I like it.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

I agree Popular vote should do it, most of the reasons for the delegates has been irrelevant for decades if not centuries.
Big reasons for the delegates was to sort thru impossible or conflicting votes, one fear during the first election was The King of England could win or Jesus could win. Later they needed people to go thru and decide which John Smith won because there could be dozens of them.

 

[pauldun170]

Popular Vote: Population centers define who wins. Rural areas lose influence.
Electoral Vote: Small states\rural areas maintain a level of representation.

 

[ElFenix]

Popular Vote: Population centers define who wins. Rural areas lose influence.
Electoral Vote: Small states\rural areas maintain a level of representation.

that's the reason for the senate (better drawn house districts where farmers were grouped with farmers instead of being used as no man's land to crack population centers would do a good job of this).

in the current system only purple states wield influence in the presidential election.

 

[Zaap]

Popular Vote: Population centers define who wins. Rural areas lose influence.
Electoral Vote: Small states\rural areas maintain a level of representation.

This.

If Hillary squeaks by with a narrow electoral win vs. pop vote (personally I think it'll be a large win, but just saying IF) then suddenly the EC will be the greatest thing since sliced butter again.

 

[fskimospy]

Popular Vote: Population centers define who wins. Rural areas lose influence.
Electoral Vote: Small states\rural areas maintain a level of representation.

I get that rural areas would have less influence than they do now but why is that bad? Since they already get hugely disproportionate influence in the House and Senate when it comes to the one person leading the country shouldn't that person be the person who the most people in the country wanted?

 

[vi edit]

From the article:

"Finally, if you're in a swing state, you probably don't like this, because it makes your vote much less significant. (On the flip side, of course, it would mean you would no longer be bombarded with campaign ads and phone calls.".

I could make an argument against that. In a state like Florida or North Carolina that have very diverse demographic groups, the overall vote can come down to crazy thin margins between candidates. When you have a state the size of Florida with almost 6,000,000 votes being cast and a difference of less than 500 votes meaning one candidate vs. another gets all 29 votes? That's a bitter pill to swallow for the nearly 3,000,000 that voted for the losing candidate. At least in that system it's possible that your 3,000,000 can be combined with others to help them win overall.

 

[realibrad]

In a pure Democracy, the majority rules. That means majority interests will always win. The electoral college was meant to take some of the voting power away from the majority and give some of it to the minority. Our current system is just one way of reducing the effects of mob rule, for better or worse.

 

[realibrad]

I get that rural areas would have less influence than they do now but why is that bad? Since they already get hugely disproportionate influence in the House and Senate when it comes to the one person leading the country shouldn't that person be the person who the most people in the country wanted?

Because when the minority have little to no power to vote in their interests, the majority takes little notice to the effects that the popular vote has.

Like most things in this country, we take a rational fear and go to the other extreme in an attempt to fix it.

Don't forget that the civil rights act would have been impossible at the time with a popular vote.

 

[fskimospy]

Because when the minority have little to no power to vote in their interests, the majority takes little notice to the effects that the popular vote has.

Changing the presidency to a majority vote would leave the minority with enormous means at their disposal to enforce their interests in the legislature.

Like most things in this country, we take a rational fear and go to the other extreme in an attempt to fix it.

It's not the other extreme at all or even remotely close to it. The House and Senate both advantage rural populations to a very large degree, a degree vastly larger than when the Constitution was designed by the way. As it exists today you could technically have a Senate majority with only about 20% of the population voting for you. You could filibuster and block all legislation with about 10% of the population if it all worked out right. There is no indication that our system of government was EVER designed to cope with disparities this large. As shown in this article, when the Constitution was enacted the largest state was about 13 times the size of the smallest. Currently the largest state is about 66 times the size of the smallest. This isn't surprising as the US (and the world) has become much more urban in the last 225 years, but what it does mean is that population centers have had their influence hugely diluted.

If anything, electing the president by popular vote would probably restore some of the urban/rural balance that has been lost over the centuries and could mark an important step towards returning things to some sort of balance. It would be a move AWAY from extremes, not towards them.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...pened-to-the-senate-without-these-two-graphs/

Don't forget that the civil rights act would have been impossible at the time with a popular vote.

No it wouldn't have, Lyndon Johnson won the popular vote in a landslide and the representatives voting for the civil rights act represented a clear majority of US citizens. If you're talking about the civil rights act by referendum, that wasn't what was being discussed?

 

[Fanatical Meat]

^^^Here is the problem Fsky, to make a change to popular vote would require amendments which no law maker from a rural area would support and no rural State would support but I suppose you already knew this.

In a purely hypothetical sense I'd much rather direct popular vote.

 

[BoomerD]

President Al Gore supports this idea.........

 

[fskimospy]

^^^Here is the problem Fsky, to make a change to popular vote would require amendments which no law maker from a rural area would support and no rural State would support but I suppose you already knew this.

In a purely hypothetical sense I'd much rather direct popular vote.

Not necessarily!!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact

So far states representing 61% of the 270 EVs needed to put the compact into effect have enacted it as law. It's an uphill climb from there as many of the biggest prizes and lowest hanging fruit have signed on, however. Still, there's a nontrivial chance that this could actually happen.

 

[OutHouse]

because we are a nation of states. think of them as 50 different countries who joined the Union making it the union. states decide who is president not the people.

if popular vote ruled then the cities of NY, Miami, Houston, Dallas, LA would decided who was president. that would really suck.

 

[Sunburn74]

Changing the presidency to a majority vote would leave the minority with enormous means at their disposal to enforce their interests in the legislature.



It's not the other extreme at all or even remotely close to it. The House and Senate both advantage rural populations to a very large degree, a degree vastly larger than when the Constitution was designed by the way. As it exists today you could technically have a Senate majority with only about 20% of the population voting for you. You could filibuster and block all legislation with about 10% of the population if it all worked out right. There is no indication that our system of government was EVER designed to cope with disparities this large. As shown in this article, when the Constitution was enacted the largest state was about 13 times the size of the smallest. Currently the largest state is about 66 times the size of the smallest. This isn't surprising as the US (and the world) has become much more urban in the last 225 years, but what it does mean is that population centers have had their influence hugely diluted.

If anything, electing the president by popular vote would probably restore some of the urban/rural balance that has been lost over the centuries and could mark an important step towards returning things to some sort of balance. It would be a move AWAY from extremes, not towards them.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...pened-to-the-senate-without-these-two-graphs/

Agreed. The current system of distribution of house and senate seats far to advantages rural areas

There was a movement a little whilst back with the libertarian party; the aim was to get libertarians to concentrate in NH. To capture the government of NH on every level would require a little under 400,000. With this they would also be able to hold Washington hostage to their demands. 400,000 people. That's like a 1/2 x 1/2 mile section of new York city getting two US senators.


The only advantage of the electoral college honestly is that it forces presidents to try to appeal as broadly as possible. However politics have become so partisan already that broad appeal doesn't really matter. No democrat will ever win Arkansas or Texas or Oklahoma in the next 50 years. Why even try? These races basically come down to turnout rather than trying to convert people from one side or the other. If these things are already set with only a handful of swing states, we should just ditch the whole system rather than pretend it makes sense. Partisan politics needs to be fixed but clearly the electoral college is not doing that. If anything it maybe promoting extremism and shameless pandering in an attempt to shore up votes. Just see the shameless right wing salute the GOP primaries were. >50 percent of Americans aren't Christians but if you want to rile up the GOP base and win those EC votes you have to polarize and become one, and not just any type of Christian but a Protestant judeo Christian. Partisan politics desperately needs to be addressed but the EC is only worsening the problem, not helping it. Can you imagine if the GOP had to now appeal to LA and NYC and Chicago and what their behavior would be like? (I throw the GOP under the bus because studies show they clearly are polarizing much much faster then the Democratic party)

 

[Sunburn74]

Duplicate post. Sorry.

 

[fskimospy]

Agreed. The current system of distribution of house and senate seats far to advantages rural areas

There was a movement a little whilst back with the libertarian party; the aim was to get libertarians to concentrate in NH. To capture the government of NH on every level would require a little under 400,000. With this they would also be able to hold Washington hostage to their demands. 400,000 people. That's like a 1/2 x 1/2 mile section of new York city getting two US senators.

The only advantage of the electoral college honestly is that it forces presidents to try to appeal as broadly as possible. However politics have become so partisan already that broad appeal doesn't really matter. No democrat will ever win Arkansas or Texas or Oklahoma in the next 50 years. Why even try? If these things are already set with only a handful of swing states, we should just ditch the whole system rather than pretend it makes sense. Partisan politics needs to be fixed but clearly the electoral college is not doing that. If anything it maybe promoting it.

It's totally ridiculous. I understand the concept of minority representation but we really need to look again at population dynamics and representation in government.

I'm not at all sure if the electoral college forces people to appeal as broadly as possible, it forces people to appeal to a select group of states as broadly as possible, which can easily exaggerate parochial concerns. I mean there's a reason why we've had an embargo on Cuba for years despite most people opposing it. I bet if Florida was a solid red or blue state that embargo would have been over years ago. I think it's ending now due to the vastly decreased influence of ultraconservative Cuban expats.

 

[Ken g6]

I would say the problem with the Electoral College currently is not that a person with less than a majority vote can win. The problem is that, if no candidate wins an outright majority, the decision is taken out of the hands of the people and given to the House. This leads to a two-party system, and to polarization, people aligning with those two parties even if other parties might fit them better.

The fix would be some kind of instant runoff, nationally, when no candidate gets a majority of the electoral votes. I'd prefer a system where I could specify candidates I want to win, ranked in order from best to worst, followed by "none of the above" when there are no candidates left that I want to win the election. In this election, probably "none of the above" would win, and then we could have new candidates nominated and maybe vote again in a couple of months.

 

[ElFenix]

2/3 of general election campaigning was done in just floriduh, ohio, pennsylvania, and north carolina this year.

none of those are small states, and they're not particularly agrarian, either.




and don't forget the whole purpose of the thing was to amplify the votes of slave states, not small states. virginia had more people than anyone else, even if they weren't entirely counted. in a direct election all the while people down south would get their votes swamped by all the white people up north. with the EC getting the slave states the extra electors from the 3/5 compromise they could wield influence.

 

[interchange]

Popular Vote: Population centers define who wins. Rural areas lose influence.
Electoral Vote: Small states\rural areas maintain a level of representation.

In popular vote, every voter has the exact same representation regardless of where they live. Electoral vote doesn't "maintain a level of representation", it actually supplements a level of representation beyond that of popular vote for small states.

I actually like that concept.

But, as has been pointed out, this is not reality because of 2 things:
1. our population density is very disproportionate from state to state
2. only a few states deviate from party line voting

I don't think some states voting according to popular vote is the solution. That will diminish the level of representation that voters in those states have, quite significantly. Suppose Texas does this and a democrat wins the popular vote by a 50.01 margin to 49.99. Now Texas will be very influential in determining the electoral college outcome, but in a direction opposite to the way their voters want.

Ideally, I would keep the electoral college but change it from winner-take-all to proportional delegates. And I would require a majority of electoral college votes required but require a run-off in the absence of that. This way, people could vote for third-party candidates much more freely.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

I love the power that our system provides to the states wrt the Senate and House, the more gridlock the better imo, but don't really understand its significance regarding the Executive. In practice it's uncommon that the popular and electoral college diverge, and if you're a conservative/Repub wanting things to stay in your favor, the electoral college also effectively eliminates tens of millions of conservative/Repub votes cast in perma-blue states (and vice versa if you're a liberal/Dem). The value in protecting rural states for their own sake seems a little arbitrary vs protecting the larger population.

I don't think some states voting according to popular vote is the solution. That will diminish the level of representation that voters in those states have, quite significantly. Suppose Texas does this and a democrat wins the popular vote by a 50.01 margin to 49.99. Now Texas will be very influential in determining the electoral college outcome, but in a direction opposite to the way their voters want.

lol, exactly. I imagine that 20-30 years from now, Republicans will be DYING for a popular vote when Arizona, Nevada, Texas, and Colorado are all borderline or reliably blue states.

 

[fskimospy]

In popular vote, every voter has the exact same representation regardless of where they live. Electoral vote doesn't "maintain a level of representation", it actually supplements a level of representation beyond that of popular vote for small states.

I actually like that concept.

But, as has been pointed out, this is not reality because of 2 things:
1. our population density is very disproportionate from state to state
2. only a few states deviate from party line voting

I don't think some states voting according to popular vote is the solution. That will diminish the level of representation that voters in those states have, quite significantly. Suppose Texas does this and a democrat wins the popular vote by a 50.01 margin to 49.99. Now Texas will be very influential in determining the electoral college outcome, but in a direction opposite to the way their voters want.

Ideally, I would keep the electoral college but change it from winner-take-all to proportional delegates. And I would require a majority of electoral college votes required but require a run-off in the absence of that. This way, people could vote for third-party candidates much more freely.

Well in the case of a national popular vote interstate compact Texas would be no more influential than any of the other states that add up to 270 votes because as per its explicit wording it only goes into effect if enough states sign on to cross the 270 mark. So Texas would be no more influential than Delaware, because if either of them dropped out the whole interstate compact wouldn't be in effect.

 

[dullard]

Popular Vote: Everyone's vote defines who wins. Purple states lose influence.
Electoral Vote: Purple states maintain a massively high level of representation. No one else matters, large or small.

Corrected that for you.

Your post was somewhat true before radio, television, internet, and mass advertising. It has long since been false. A single vote in North Dakota has no influence since it is such a red state that one vote means nothing. A single vote in Florida may swing the election. Thus, your small state idea is completely false.

 

[interchange]

Well in the case of a national popular vote interstate compact Texas would be no more influential than any of the other states that add up to 270 votes because as per its explicit wording it only goes into effect if enough states sign on to cross the 270 mark. So Texas would be no more influential than Delaware, because if either of them dropped out the whole interstate compact wouldn't be in effect.

Fair enough. I didn't read deeply enough.

 

[EOM]

A better modification would be to award electoral votes proportionally within the state instead of winner take all and introduce ranked choice voting.