Thursday, February 18, 2010

Two Cheers For the Electoral College

George Soros is funding an effort to undermine the Electoral College. The idea is to enter into a compact with other states in which each state agrees to require their electors to vote for the candidate who has won the national popular vote. The compact would not become effective until states comprising a majority of electoral votes have agreed.

The effort has resulted in the introduction of AB 751 in the Wisconsin legislature.

The proposal may well be unconstitutional under the Compact Clause. It is almost certainly motivated by partisan concerns. It isn't simply that Democrats tend to be more geographically concentrated. That can actually help if Democratic voters are packed in the right states. Thus, while Bush lost the popular election and won the electoral vote in '00, Kerry almost did the same thing in '04.

Rather, the back story is population trends that will move electoral votes to Republican states. For the first time in who can remember, California will not pick up a seat and the Midwest and Northeast continue to lose population to the south and southwest.

Republicans should not be too sanguine. Large influxes of people into a state can change its political composition. When I was a kid, California was a fairly Republican state. But there is, nevertheless, reason to suspect that the Electoral map is going to get tougher for Democrats.

On the merits, the preferability of a national popular vote is not obvious. In yesterday's Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Rep. Kelda Helen Roys makes an argument that seems wrong.
Furthermore, every vote is not equal in presidential elections. Al Gore won five electoral votes by carrying New Mexico by 365 popular votes in 2000, whereas George W. Bush won five electoral votes by carrying Utah by 312,043 popular votes - an 855-to-1 disparity in the value of a vote between two similarly populated states.


It's not obvious to me that the fact that one state is close and another is not alters the "value" of a vote. The Electoral College does result in some disproportion in the weighting of a vote but it's not because some states are competitive and others are not. It's because each state gets two Senators regardless of population (and to, a lesser extent, the fact that some very small population states get one representative.)

But the fact that one vote has a "better" (albeit still infinitesimal) chance of deciding an election does not mean that it "counts more." Thus, in the example she cites, a vote in Utah had precisely the same Electoral weight as one in New Mexico.

A better complaint (and one that Rep. Roys also makes)is that the Electoral College forces candidates to give disproportionate attention to competitive states. To the extent that the policy preferences of these competitive states don't match the aggregate policy preferences of the nation, one can argue that this effect constitutes a "distortion" of the campaign.

That is a weakness of the Electoral College. But it is also its strength.

The Electoral College forces candidates to pay attention to states that they otherwise might not. But there may be a certain genius to that. Forcing candidates into battleground states requires the candidates to engage each other before an electorate that is truly up for grabs and to do so by engaging - at least to some degree - in retail politics - much as the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary do in the nomination process.

If you see a campaign as a dialogue in which candidates must engage the voters as opposed to a ratification of preexisting interests, there may be some value in this. A campaign resulting in a national popular vote would look very different than our current campaigns. It would be even more media intensive and, I suspect, more ideologically polarized.

Part of your attitude toward the electoral college will depend on how important you think state and geographic interests are. At the time of the founding, it mattered a great deal. While the electoral college does not guarantee broad geographical support, it tends to force candidates to take into account the interests and preferences of parts of the country that it might otherwise be rational to ignore. It can enhance the influence of minorities who, while they may be insignificant nationally, are important in a critical state.

If you don't buy that, then there are other "reforms" that might interest you such as allocation of Senate seats by population. Perhaps you may even want to consider abandon of single member districts elected by the Westminster method of "first past the post" in favor of multi-member districts with proportional representations. To extend Rep. Roys' reasoning, her district is heavily Democratic and not competitive. In fact, it was probably intentionally drawn to be that way.

Borrowing from her concept of the "value" of a vote, there is a sense in that her constituents have less impact on the composition of the assembly - and, therefore, which laws get passed and which do not - than a voter in a competitive district. If the national - or statewide - policy and will is what matters, then I ought to be far more interested in whether the Republicans or Democrats hold Congress or the State legislature than I am in the identity of "my" legislator.

To be sure there are differences between an election for President and one for a legislator who, by certain theories of representation, is supposed to represent the geographic interests of her constituents. My only point is that the matter is far more complicated than reification of the national popular vote and that we ought to be reluctant to take a position on whose ox we think will be gored.

Cross posted at Marquette University Law School Faculty Blog

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

But there is, nevertheless, reason to suspect that the Electoral map is going to get tougher for Democrats.

Sounds like your desire to maintain electoral college control is equally as partisan as the push to circumvent it. Sure, you have other reasons to oppose the move, as you laid out here, but those on the other side also have other reasons to support it. Partisanship isn't unique to one side of the debate.

Forcing candidates into battleground states requires the candidates to engage each other before an electorate that is truly up for grabs and to do so by engaging - at least to some degree - in retail politics - much as the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary do in the nomination process.

I'm not so sure moving to a national popular vote means there would be less engagement between candidates or, just as importantly, between a candidate and the voters. Perhaps, and maybe even probably, the engagement would be different, at least in some ways, but by removing any threshold a campaign needs to meet to win (i.e., 272 electoral votes), it means winning campaigns will need to look to non-traditional voters to get their vote totals as high as possible everywhere, and that could bring engagement on a whole host of new issues and, as a result, engage a whole host of new people in the process.

And rather than have candidates fall back to their respective corners of the country for votes, I think what you'd find is far more engagement from GOP candidates w/ voters in blue states and Dem candidates w/ voters in red states as a means for constructing a winning strategy, since just rallying the base still wouldn't be enough.

And, it's also plausible a national popular vote would bring about more intellectual consistency and honesty in presidential platforms, since candidates won't face incentives to craft campaigns around an electoral map.

Bottom line, there's no reason an election should hinge on how candidates appeal to voters in a single state or a even a handful of states.

neomom said...

And since the system has served us pretty well for over two centuries, there is very little reason to change it just because the Progressives wanted Al Gore to win.

3rd Way said...

While the electoral college does not guarantee broad geographical support, it tends to force candidates to take into account the interests and preferences of parts of the country that it might otherwise be rational to ignore. It can enhance the influence of minorities who, while they may be insignificant nationally, are important in a critical state.

The exact opposite is also true. The gay marriage referendum was huge in CA during the '08 campaign. If CA had been a competitive state Obama and McCain would have had to take stronger positions on the issue and it probably would have had much more national attention. But the issue didn't receive as much attention because neither candidate spent any time campaigning in the state.

There is very little reason to change it just because the Progressives wanted Al Gore to win.

Not only progressives, but the majority of voting Americans wanted to Gore to win. I would love to see how the right reacts if Obama wins the electoral college, but loses the popular election in 2012. The simple truth is not all votes are equal in our Electoral College system. Your judgement on the justice of that inequity is likely dependent on the effect that inequity has had on your preferred candidate.

Jason said...

There might be some benefits to the electoral college but I still find it hard to believe that we're still using a system that only takes into consideration the votes of the majority instead of every single voter. For the last presidential election, it was obvious that my state would be voting overwhelmingly for the candidate I didn't want, so I just ended up voting for my favorite non dem/rep. I'm sure plenty others just didn't bother to vote at all. Not a great way to get citizens to take a interest in their country.

http://www.nwinjurylawcenter.com

Billiam said...

If you go by the popular vote, you're telling the voters of Wisconsin that their vote doesn't count. If Wisconsin voters vote for candidate a in majority, but candidate b wins nationally, your giving Wisconsins electoral votes to b, rather than a, the people of Wisconsins choice. That's just plain wrong.

3rd Way said...

The electoral college in 2000 told the voters of Wisconsin that their vote didn't count. Wisconsin voters voted for candidate a in majority (along with the national majority), but candidate b won the electoral college in opposition to the people's choice.

How is that any less wrong?

I know it is constitutionally correct, but sometimes the constitution needs to be amended.

For what it is worth: The participants in the JSOnline poll yesterday agreed that the electoral college should be changed (by a razor thin majority).

Doug said...

But there is no way that a nationally election won't cause a candidate from shaping policy around those state that will win him the vote. Let's say "I'll bailout California". That causes California to vote for this candidate. But other states vote against. Enough of the bigger states like the bailout plan because they may get some to. Smaller states may not like paying for this. Too bad. National popular vote could screw you. Of course, you probably won't see any more of those obnoxious political messages.

Anonymous said...

If you go by the popular vote, you're telling the voters of Wisconsin that their vote doesn't count.

WI votes will still be contributing to the national total. In fact, this happens all of the time in other races. If my local ward votes for candidate A, but the district as a whole votes for candidate B, that doesn't mean my vote and the others from my ward didn't count.

Enough of the bigger states like the bailout plan because they may get some to. Smaller states may not like paying for this. Too bad. National popular vote could screw you.

There were about 120 million voters in the 2008 election. Even if a candidate got every vote from the 8 highest voting states (CA, TX, NY, PA, IL, OH, FL, and MI) it still wouldn't be enough to outweigh the other states. Frankly, the notion of states voting in solid blocks in a big state vs. little state scenario is pretty out there. But, the fact is, you wouldn't be able to come up with a scenario where the same outcome wouldn't exist with the electoral college under the same scenario.

Jay Bullock said...

George Soros is funding an effort to undermine the Electoral College
Source?