The National Popular Vote movement seems to be gaining momentum in the country. Legislatures in a number of states, primarily “blue states”, have already decided that their electors in the Electoral College must cast their ballots for the candidate who wins the nationwide popular vote no matter what the outcome in their own state. In other words, a blue state like Connecticut would have to give its votes to a Republican candidate if he or she won the national vote count.
The movement was given impetus by Donald Trump’s victory in 2016. Fueling anti-Trump sentiment was the fact that he won by a good margin in the Electoral College while trailing opponent Hillary Clinton by about 1% in the popular vote count. Some have called for discarding the Electoral College as an eighteenth century anachronism but others feel it would be easier to require state electors to follow the national vote results.
I believe the National Popular Vote movement started back in 2000 when Governor George W. Bush of Texas defeated Vice-President Al Gore in what was at the time the most litigated election in history. After a number of recounts in the pivotal state of Florida, the election was only decided by a decision of the U.S. Supreme court to validated Bush’s narrow victory in that state. Nevertheless, bitterness persisted in the defeated party especially since Bush trailed Gore in the national popular vote count.
When President Bush was asked if his victory was tainted, he gave a very pragmatic reply. He said that if the outcome of the contest depended on the national vote count, he and the Republicans would have run a different campaign. He claimed that he could have easily gained more than million a votes in his home state of Texas alone. There was very little need for Republicans to get out the vote in Texas or spend valuable time and money there because it was a safe state.
Recently the Connecticut legislature decided to support the movement that would require the State to cast its future Electoral College votes unanimously for the winner of the popular vote in the national election. In other words, no matter how the people of Connecticut cast their votes, the State would have to go along with the voters of the other states. This idea, which would effectively eliminate the Electoral College that has been in the Constitution from day one, is regarded as a triumph of democracy even though it could negate the votes of the majority of citizens in Connecticut.
Anyone who bothers to read the Constitution of the United States will see that originally the President of the United States was not to be chosen by a direct vote of the people. The President and Vice-President were to be chosen by electors who would be citizens within each state and who were expected to be independent or above popular pressure. The President was to be the nation’s chief executive and his choice would resemble the way a Board of Directors today would nominate a new CEO.
Inevitably, as democracy grew in the new country it became the practice for the Electors to abide by the popular vote in their states in casting their ballots for President. Theoretically, they could disregard their citizens’ preference and vote their own opinion but Electors have rarely done so. Only in the most recent election did we see displeasure with the outcome lead some to urge Electors to disregard the voters in their states.
You may call me a traditionalist but I like the Electoral College. I like the fact that it has worked remarkably well in the past. I don’t think it is an anachronism. In a parliamentary democracy like Great Britain the Prime Minister is still not chosen by a direct popular vote but by a majority of the members of the House of Commons who are elected by their respective constituents from all over the country.
The true democratic element in our Constitution is to be found in our House of Representatives whose members have always been directly elected by the people. Indeed, members of the House must stand for re-election every two years because it was believed that frequent elections would make them more responsive to the people. Unfortunately, this idea has turned out to be little more than a pipe dream since it is really difficult these days to unseat an incumbent Representative.
I like the Electoral College not only because it has worked remarkably well so far in creating a political stability in this country that should be the envy of the rest of the world, but also because it would be hard to imagine what our elections would look like if we were to just neglect the states and give the Presidency to the winner of the nationwide popular vote.
Presidential campaigns have already become a kind of circus or TV reality show where the candidates are chosen as if they were on American Idol. Many people were furious that Donald Trump was able to parley his nationwide name-recognition and TV skills into a successful run for the Presidency. It was amazing to see this real estate mogul and reality show personality use his communication skills to plow through a very high quality, and more politically experienced group of opponents during the Republican debates.
In the Ukraine they just elected a popular comedian to the Presidency. Is this what we want in America?
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