Imagine a U.S. Presidential election without obsessions over Ohio, Florida, or other swing states. A presidential election in which there are no red states or blue states, an election in which the winner of the national popular vote wins, regardless on which states that candidate won.
That reality may be sooner than you think.
Since 2007, 10 states and the District of Columbia representing 165 electoral votes have signed on to The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, in which the states agree to award their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote and not on the popular vote from that state. There are also currently active bills to join the compact in Michigan and Pennsylvania, which would bring the total to 201 electoral votes-74% of the 270 votes needed for the compact to go into effect.
The Compact is based on the 1st Section of Article II of the U.S. Constitution, which allows states to decide on how to award their electoral college votes. Currently 48 of the 50 states award their electoral votes to the winner in their states, while Nebraska and Maine award their electoral votes by the winner of each district.
Ending the electoral college system as we know it would change our democracy for the better. Instead of spending most of their time in, say, Ohio, and focusing exclusively on the issues facing that state, presidential candidates would be free to campaign in other states regardless of whether or not that candidates party has won the state in the past. It would especially be beneficial to the state of California. Under the current system, the 2016 Democratic and Republican Nominees for President will not spend their time in the Golden State in the waning days of the campaign, with the possible exception of fundraising. But if the candidates no longer had to worry about the electoral college vote and instead have to worry about their popular vote totals, then you can bet they would spend a lot of their time in the most populous state in the country. Issues facing California such as the drought would force positions from each candidate and receive national attention.
It's not just Democrats like myself who are rooting for this compact to go through before 2016. 73% of Independents and 60% of Republicans support a direct national popular vote for President. The GOP might even benefit more from this compact than Democrats. Under the current system, the GOP nominee for President in 2016 will have to run the tables in order to win the electoral votes necessary to win the election, with states such as Michigan and Pennsylvania no longer considered tossup states. And shifting demographics may turn states such as Georgia and Texas from solid red states to tossup states in the not-so-distant future.
Since the founding of this country there have been four presidential elections in which the eventual winner lost the popular vote, the most recent being the infamous 2000 Florida debacle in which George W. Bush won the Sunshine State's 25 electoral votes by 528 votes despite winning over half a million fewer votes nationally than Al Gore.
So far the states that have signed the compact have been blue states such as California and New York, so red states and tossup states will be critical in getting the compact to go into effect (although tossup states may be reluctant to sign the agreement since their states would no longer be critical in determining the next President).
It has often been stated that turnout in U.S. Presidential Elections is lower than turnout in other developed democracies. There have been many efforts in order to mobilize voters to go to the polls, but I believe more voters won't be motivated to turnout until they know for sure that their vote would truly affect the outcome.
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).
ReplyDeleteSupport for a national popular vote is strong among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group in virtually every state surveyed in recent polls
in recent or past closely divided Battleground states: CO – 68%, FL – 78%, IA --75%, MI – 73%, MO – 70%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM– 76%, NC – 74%, OH – 70%, PA – 78%, VA – 74%, and WI – 71%;
in Small states (3 to 5 electoral votes): AK – 70%, DC – 76%, DE – 75%, ID – 77%, ME – 77%, MT – 72%, NE -74%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM – 76%, OK – 81%, RI – 74%, SD – 71%, UT – 70%, VT – 75%, WV – 81%, and WY – 69%;
in Southern and Border states: AR – 80%, KY- 80%, MS – 77%, MO – 70%, NC – 74%, OK – 81%, SC – 71%, TN – 83%, VA – 74%, and WV – 81%; and
in other states polled: AZ – 67%, CA – 70%, CT – 74%, MA – 73%, MN – 75%, NY – 79%, OR – 76%, and WA – 77%.
The National Popular Vote bill has passed 33 state legislative chambers in 22 rural, small, medium, large, Democratic, Republican and purple states with 250 electoral votes, including one house in Arkansas (6), Connecticut (7), Delaware (3), The District of Columbia, Maine (4), Michigan (16), Nevada (6), New Mexico (5), North Carolina (15), Oklahoma (7), and Oregon (7), and both houses in California, Colorado (9), Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington. The bill has been enacted by the District of Columbia (3), Hawaii (4), Illinois (19), New Jersey (14), Maryland (11), California (55), Massachusetts (10), New York (29), Vermont (3), Rhode Island (4), and Washington (13). The bill has 61% of the 270 electoral votes necessary to bring the law into effect.
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