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Republicans Government Politics

West Virginian Mayor Might Defy Popular Vote 308

Posted by timothy from the now-how-collegiate-is-that dept.
gleam writes "A maverick Republican mayor in West Virginia is reportedly considering not casting his vote in the Electoral College for Bush, even if Bush wins the popular vote there. South Charleston Mayor Richie Robb says, 'I know that among some in my own party, what I'm discussing would be considered treasonous, but I'm not going to cheerlead us down the primrose path when I know we're being led in the wrong direction.' It wouldn't be the first time a West Virginian Elector defied the popular vote: In 1988 an Elector cast her vote for Michael Dukakis's running mate, Lloyd Bentsen, even though Dukakis won the state's popular vote."
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West Virginian Mayor Might Defy Popular Vote More

West Virginian Mayor Might Defy Popular Vote

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  • "We have a duty and responsibility to cast our electoral votes behind the president if he wins West Virginia," Capehart said. "Because that's what the Republican Party expected when they chose us."

    This is a telling statement. Shouldn't Capehart be more concerned about this guy representing the popular vote, in other words, the voice of the majority of people of West Virginia...instead of standing "behind the president?"

    tcd004
    • They're Republican electors - they only get to vote if Bush does win the popular vote in WV.
    • I'm not sure what you're getting at here. He said "if he wins West Virginia". The states DO represent the popular vote, and the only way this joker can be the elector would be if Bush does win the popular vote.

      If Bush doesn't win the popular vote there, then the Democrat electors will cast the votes in the electorial college.

      There are two sets of electoral college voters... one for each party.

      • As an outsider... (Score:3, Interesting)

        by brunes69 ( 86786 )
        The US two-party-only system has always baffled me. Every thing I learn more about the system supports the concept that it is pretty much by law only a two-party state.

        For example, your above comment. What would happen if an independant candidate won a state? Who would be the electoral college voter?
        • It is not two party only. Remember Nader? If he had won as state his electors would have been empowered to vote for him (or someone else, some states make it mandatory, some don't0.

        • Re:As an outsider... (Score:3, Informative)

          by esme ( 17526 )

          Every candidate who is on the ballot provides a slate of electors. So whoever wins sends their people to the electoral college.

          -Esme

        • Re:As an outsider... (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Jerf ( 17166 ) on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @09:38PM (#10196873) Journal
          It is a two party system because of emergent effects from the voting system [denbeste.nu] (about 1/3rd of the way in to that piece). I also think that link is the best defense of the current system. I used to think our voting system was flawed for the usual reasons trotted out on Slashdot but now I think not many people understand how well our system works; voting between "two evils" is actually something of a feature.

          Also note that today's Republican Party is a third party. They killed off the Whig party a long time ago. It is not impossible for that to happen again. If the Democrats don't shed their radical leftists*, it may happen again really soon.

          (Bi-Partisan note: Part of the reason the Republicans are doing so well is that they analysed their failures during the Clinton era and marginalized some groups like the Christian Right that were detrimental to them. (Criticisms that the Republicans are controlled by them are now out of date.) Hopefully, after Kerry tanks the Democrats will do some housecleaning and re-align with the center a little better. I could never vote for Kerry, but if they put forth someone who doesn't have to pander to the loony left, I might consider it. (Bi-Partison note the second: Yes, I would say the Republicans shook off their loony right. "Loonies" here are people who consider a person or position 100% evil with no chance of facts changing their mind.))

          • Re:As an outsider... (Score:3, Informative)

            by a whoabot ( 706122 )
            Raidcal leftists? Explain. Your asterisk led me nowhere*. Like, I know some radical leftists, like say, anti-social anarchists, and they're a far cry from anything the Democratic party even comes close to, even, being in the same universe as.

            *Did you mean your note on "Loonies"? Maybe your definition of radical differs from the one generally well understood in most politcal or social theory, but "radical" theory is not required at all to have to do with changing one's mind or considerations on evil. It

            • Re:As an outsider... (Score:3, Informative)

              by Jerf ( 17166 )
              Sorry, it was meant to lead to the "Bi-partisan note", which was meant to show I think there are "loonies" on both sides, or at least were in the recent past. (Of course the Republicans haven't 100% removed them, but they no longer set the agenda.)

              I define "loonies" as I did, as I also define "liberal" and "conservative" damn near everytime I use them, because there are so many definitions of the words that when you see them in isolation, they are worse than meaningless. On my blog, I have alternately used

          • Re:As an outsider... (Score:5, Informative)

            by NateTech ( 50881 ) on Thursday September 09, 2004 @06:49AM (#10199030)
            Note: On the world stage, many view the entire U.S. system as skewed to the Right.

            One example, politicalcompass.com [politicalcompass.com] puts Kerry nearly center on a graph of left/right and also of authoritarian/libertarian, with GWB further right and authoritarian than Kerry.

            A differnt type of world leader, such as Ghandi and Nelson Mandella fall left and libertarian.

            In that light, Kerry's the more "centered" to the world, which GWB is the radical. The far left in the Dems are probably quite a way over on the graph, but could be either authoritarian or libertarian depending on their views.

            Of interesting note, virtually no world leaders fall in the Libertarian/Right quadrant - a rare person indeed.
      • Electors for each STATE do cast their vote based on the popular tally of their state. Electoral math starts to get weird when elections get close, like last time when several states were won or lost by only a few thousand votes. That's when you get a situation where enough electoral votes to win (270) going for one candidate, while the grand TOTAL individual votes from ALL states is actually for another candidate. This election in particular, I wonder if the members of the electoral college are mulling thie
        • The electoral votes/popular vote problem is a result of a 10 year census (and the congressional redistricting/electoral college rebalance that follows). I'd be all for a system that redistributes every two years, but the census bureau budget would have to be increased and there would be bitter redistricting fights every two years instead of every 10. Actually what would be best would for the census to be a headcount of all eligible voters done in the 1st half of even numbered years. Redistricting would t
        • People like to blame the electoral college system on the screwy mess of the previous election, but the truth is that Gore's lead in the nation-wide popular vote was even narrower than Bush's victory in Florida. Had we been using a popular-vote-only system in 2000, Bush would have been compelled by his party to call for a recount, and would be right to do so. For all we even know today (since no such massive event occurred), Gore's nation-wide "popular victory" could have been the result of counting errors

  • Wild prediction (Score:5, Insightful)

    by deanj ( 519759 ) on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @07:28PM (#10195876)
    ...People that agree with him will call him "honorable". People that don't will call him a "traitor".
    • And those of us crazy crackpots that are in favor of states' rights and would like to see the Electoral College used as intended for once things this is kinda cool.

      • Re:Wild prediction (Score:5, Insightful)

        by caseih ( 160668 ) on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @08:35PM (#10196417)
        I don't know. If I was in his state and he didn't vote according to the popular vote then I'd feel very much like he stole from me personally my right to influence the election process. Doing what he proposes is morally questionable, to say nothing of legality. How can he, being an elected official, simply ignore the wishes of the citizens of his state who voted (should the vote come in favor of Bush).
        • Doing this wouldn't be illegal. From TFA:

          There is no provision in the West Virginia code that controls what an elector does at the Electoral College or provides any punishment for faithless electors.

          This happend in West Virginia in 1988, and it was postulated that this might happen in 2000, because Gore won the popular vote.

          Only about half of the states bind electorates to their candidates -- through their state constitutions.

          Part of the reason for the electoral college is because us "common folk" [cstation.info] ar

    • ...People that agree with him will call him "honorable". People that don't will call him a "traitor".

      I may or may not be considered a Democrat and I fer damn sure am not voting for Bush but at the same time I don't think this guy has the right to go against the wishes of the majority (assuming they even win of course :).
      That said I think the whole electoral process is a crock and half. I understand that it was put in place to "protect the rights of the states" but I don't see how a popular vote real
      • It provides some protection for smaller states. Because the votes in the electoral college are determined by the number of representatives + senators, each state has at least 3 votes. States like North Dakota (with only 1 representative) have a slightly higher per capita say in the election of the President than a state like California (with something like 4000 representatives - the 2 "bonus" votes don't really matter).

        The electoral college - and particularly its all or nothing stakes - forces the candi

    • Actually, members of both camps who are familiar with the law will call him "faithless."

      This happens every four years. Somebody who's unfamiliar with election law and history comes along and says, "I ain't votin' fer that one no matter what my constichency say." And then he gets yanked according to the "faithless elector" law and makes a big squawk for about 20 minutes. Then everybody forgets for four years.
      • I'm not familiar with the US system. But it seems that the people pick the electors who then pick the president. But what other powers/responsibilities do the electors have?

        If the elector's role is not just electing the president and involves other things then since this particular elector has _announced_publicly_ he might not vote for Bush, arguably if the people still vote for the elector it means they want him in for the other things he does, and they're not bothered if he doesn't vote the party line.

        A
        • So I don't really see what's so wrong if he openly declares his wishes. If people vote him in and they want him to vote for Bush they're stupid.

          We don't vote for the electors, we actually vote for the presidential candidates. The popular vote within a state determines which party's electors are then sent to the electoral college.

          Yes, it made more sense two hundred years ago when news and electors traveled by horse. However there are still some benefits to the indirect election of a president. Smaller
      • It's too bad that the US electoral system casts out people who stand by their convictions. That's one thing that I can actually say I appreciate about George W. Bush and Tony Blair. Right or wrong, they have convictions and stand by them. Mind you, that's also the only good thing I have to say about them.

        Lack of any beliefs or willingness to stand up for them seems to be one of the fundamental problems with US politics.
        • It's too bad that the US electoral system casts out people who stand by their convictions.

          It's too bad that you never took a government or a political science class. Or cracked a book, evidently. Or know thing one about American governance or politics.

          Please recognize the limits of your knowledge. You don't hear me telling you who to elect as your next grand high moose herder, or whatthefuckever.
      • I'm pretty sure that's handled on a state by state basis. The crux of the problem apparently is that West Virginia has no statutes directing the actions of their electors, nor for punishing them in the case of the above behavior. Some states do, West Virginian apparently isn't one of them.
      • Actually, not all states have faithless elector laws. West Virginia is one of those that does not have one.

        In fact, 24 states have no repercussions for an elector voting against the winning ticket.

        There's also some discussion about whether faithless elector laws are even constitutional.

        -gleam

  • Hmm.. (Score:4, Funny)

    by WhatAmIDoingHere ( 742870 ) <sexwithanimals@gmail.com> on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @07:28PM (#10195877) Homepage
    I wonder when the IRS is going to start looking very carefully at this man's returns..

  • The Electoral College in Action (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ElForesto ( 763160 ) <elforestoNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @07:28PM (#10195879) Homepage
    This is exactly what the electoral college is designed for, as a check against a popularly-elected president that horrifies Congress. It's usually in the best interests of the electors to go with the flow and approve who the voters choose, but it exists in case the next Hitler comes along so that even with a popular vote such a person would not come to power. (No, I don't think anyone running is the next Hitler, but hyperbole is great for driving points home.)
    • I call Godwin's Law! =^_^= OK, next thread.

    • Total nonsense. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by brunes69 ( 86786 ) <`gro.daetsriek' `ta' `todhsals'> on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @07:52PM (#10196091)

      This is exactly what the electoral college is designed for...

      ...but it exists in case the next Hitler comes along so that even with a popular vote such a person would not come to power. (No, I don't think anyone running is the next Hitler, but hyperbole is great for driving points home

      I am really getting sick of people spouting this BS in articles like this lately.

      The electoral college system was designed because 200 years ago, it was the only logical way to do things. You didn't have cars, planes, or busses. All you had was horses.

      Imagine a country-wide vote in 1800. Imagine the mountains and mountains of paper that would all have to be delivered to Washington by horseback. Imagine the number of postman involved, any one of which could easily be picked off, or bribed. Imagine how long it would take to count.

      The electoral college was developed so that you only had to send one person / state to Washington. The individual states could each count the votes in their state, then they know what to tell their guy to vote for. it is the only thing that made sense logistically.

      Nowadays, however, all the reasons for it are gone. Your argument is rubbish - why are the electoral college voters more suited for judging character than the populace as a whole? I wouldn't trust most of the politicians I know with keys to my house, let alone keys to the country's vote.

      • Checks and Balances (Score:4, Insightful)

        by ElForesto ( 763160 ) <elforestoNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @08:05PM (#10196177) Homepage

        It's just another layer of "check and balance" that's been built into this system. I'm not surprised that you (and I imagine many like-minded people) want to throw it out as I'm sure it seems arcane, but you must more carefully consider it. A lot of people said the same thing about US Senators, that the people should be trusted to choose them directly instead of letting the legislatures choose them. Are we better off now with direct election of Senators, or worse off?

        I'd tend to say that we are worse off now. Senators operate largely on the same basis as the House: whoever brings home the most bacon gets re-elected. It also means the legislative body represents the interests of the people only and not of the states. While the Founders were distrustful of power and authority, there were also distrustful of allowing direct control of all government by the people as a whole.

        I think you need to do a little reconsidering of your position. After having read on several of the Founders, I doubt they were more concerned with election fraud than direct elections.

        • The problem with Senators in the US is that they are elected. Thus, they really serve no purpose at all. They are just another copy of the lower house.

          In most every other democracy in the that has a two-house system, the upper house is appointed - not elected, and members serve for life (or until they retire).

          While the idea of an unelected house may seem un-democratic, it has many attributes that make it a much better "buffer" than an elected upper house. Since the body appointing the members is of a pa

          • The problem with Senators in the US is that they are elected. Thus, they really serve no purpose at all. They are just another copy of the lower house.

            ...

            While the idea of an unelected house may seem un-democratic, it has many attributes that make it a much better "buffer" than an elected upper house. Since the body appointing the members is of a particular party, they will appoint people who favor their views. however, since a member of Senate serves for life, over the long term, rather than have on

          • You're missing the point. The Senate was not meant to be a House of Lords - it was created in order to give small states an equal standing with larger states, while at the same time allowing larger states to have more representation in the House. Moreover, ensuring that the legislative branch is elected rather than appointed is an important check on the executive branch, since the executive branch chooses the justices of the Supreme Court (the judicial branch). Since the Senate must approve the choice of ju

            • Moreover, ensuring that the legislative branch is elected rather than appointed is an important check on the executive branch, since the executive branch chooses the justices of the Supreme Court (the judicial branch). Since the Senate must approve the choice of justices that the executive branch makes, it's important that the Senate is not chosen by the executive branch as well

              You are missing the point. The fact that the executive branch chooses the legislative branch is all but irrelevant in a House of

              • You are missing the point. The fact that the executive branch chooses the legislative branch is all but irrelevant in a House of Lords style system because the members serve for life. In order for the executive branch to stack the house with people who side with them on judicial appointments, the same executive would have to be elected many times in a row - something that is highly unlikely to happen.

                Instead of appointing Senators, how about only allowing taxpayors to elect them. If the net of what you

            • . The Senate was not meant to be a House of Lords - it was created in order to give small states an equal standing with larger states, while at the same time allowing larger states to have more representation in the House.

              Having an appointed Senate would have no effect on this. The argument over whether or not the US Senate should be appointed by state legislature or appointed by popular vote is really more about whether you lean more towards a pure democracy or a more republican system of government.

              Wh
        • Thank you, thank you, thank you, for expressing something I've been thinking about for a long time:

          Popular election of Senators may be a bad idea.

          "How", you say? "How dare you!", some of you scream. Well, how long have we been complaining that real statesmanship is missing from Congress? The Senate was supposed to be the wise check on the popular passions of the day when the Constituion was written. The Senate was not supposed to be anti-democratic. It was not meant to block the will of the House, those p
          • How often do you hear someone of one party praise someone of another party? Not often.

            John McCain. Most everyone I know loves John McCain, even the staunch Democrats (like myself).

            Still, I have to agree that the current political climate makes it damn hard for a politican to get away with sticking with his convictions and speaking his mind rather than rolling over and doing what is demanded by party and fashion. (McCain is another great example of this.)
          • How many truly great Senators have there been last century? ... In the latter half of the 20th century, I can think of only two I'd apply this label to: Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York, and John C Stennis of Mississippi.

            I can think of a couple dozen from both parties, and would not put either of the two you named on that list.

            A couple "moderate" power brokers pissing in the pools of their own parties could not possibly shine as brightly as a Barry Goldwater or a Hubert H. Humphrey.
      • It's partially that, and it's partially the fact that the Founding Fathers didn't trust the populace to make the right decision. The electoral college, in effect, was to act as a buffer.

        This is the same kind of reason why we even have a President, which is to make the ignorant masses think we have a king.

        I'm just sayin'... is all. :)
        • Ugh. I get so tired of this old falsehood. It had nothing to do with not trusting the populace. It had to do with the type of government they wanted to set up.

          Democracy is nothing more than mob rule. The founding fathers wanted a REPUBLIC. A nation of semi-autonomous united states. Within the states, direct popular votes were expected. It was on the FEDERAL level that power was to be limited. Everything the founders did from the bill of rights to the electoral college, to the appointing of senators by stat

      • Re:Total nonsense. (Score:4, Informative)

        by ageoffri ( 723674 ) on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @08:24PM (#10196344)
        I am really getting sick of people spouting this BS in articles like this lately. The electoral college system was designed because 200 years ago, it was the only logical way to do things. You didn't have cars, planes, or busses. All you had was horses.

        I really suggest you read the Federal Papers before you make yourself look uneducated. There was no single reason the electoral process was chosen. Distance and communication was one. Another was to avoid foreign powers having an effect on the election of the President. They used words like "prostitue the vote" and assumed an Elector would be better educated then the general public and could avoid foriegn manipulation. Yet another reason was to balance the small states vs the large states. Don't belive me, then take a look at the information from the US Government on the electoral college. Also note that the electoral college is made up of the number of Senators and Represenitives.

        Nowdays one of the reasons for the electoral college is gone, but not all of them.

      • Then why... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Rufus88 ( 748752 )
        The electoral college was developed so that you only had to send one person / state to Washington

        Then why wasn't the system codified to require the elector to merely report the majority vote for the state, and not allow him/her the option to ignore the will of the people?

      • Re:Total nonsense. (Score:4, Insightful)

        by ComputerSlicer23 ( 516509 ) on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @09:24PM (#10196764)
        Unless you have some historical basis for this from the Founding Father's original papers, I'm thinking you are wrong, or at least it's not the only reason. The original poster you are replying to has it roughly correct, but is missing a few details.

        As it's been taught to me, and from what I've read of the Constitution and other important documents from the Founding Father's, the critical reason for the Electoral College is that we are a collection of states. It is split for exactly the same reasons we have both the House and the Senate, where in the House each state gets votes according to their population, but in the Senate it was one state, two votes.

        The reason for the split (and also the reason that both the Vice President and President can't come from the same state), is that the original colonies we're afraid that the most populace (I believe Virgina and Pennsylvania at the time) would dominate Rhode Island (which by the way, isn't the original name of the state), Connecticut, Delaware and Maryland. They wouldn't have ratified the Constitution. It was a political compromise (just like requiring that all of the appropriations of money start in the House of Representatives is). If we didn't have an electoral college any guy who promised huge benefits to a few densely populated states would win out, and abuse the other smaller states.

        It's still protecting us today, because otherwise carrying California, Texas, New York, Massachusates, and a handful of other very densely populated areas would be all you had to do. In fact, to see this, go find the chart for the election results by county from 2000 (I can't find a link, but I remember roughly what it looked like). It looked almost exactly like a photograph of the US at night from space. All the really dark areas won Bush, all the really light areas were for Gore. It was an absolute landslide in for Bush in those terms. However, Gore carried the most populated areas. The founding father's feared such a diacotomy, it'd end up with a government who had no interest in representing a large group of people's interests, because they weren't popular enough. South and North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Nebraska, Iowa, Mississippi, New Mexico, and probably a few other states, would be vastly under represented precisely because they we're a minority.

        The Founding Father's felt that the state was the proper unit to give authority to. We are a collection of States who band together for protection and bargining rights when dealing with foreign nations, and to facilitate resolutions to internal conflict. That's what the Federal Government original was designed to do. Read up on the Federalist system sometime. State's have authority.

        I'll point out, that it's just as easy to bribe an electoral voter as it is a postman. Remember, that at the time the Founding Father's setup the government, there were not all the states that currently existed. I'd be shocked if it would have taken more then 3-4 weeks to travel the length and breadth of the country then, even on horse back. Remember people used to travel from the east coast to the West Coast on horseback in about 6 months (you could only travel during warm weather, and hence and to get across the Rockies within a relatively specific time frame). There wasn't a state west of West Virgina at the time. It's also why states have from the first week of November until Dec 18, of the year to get the electoral college votes to Washington D.C.

        Kirby

        • Re:Total nonsense. (Score:3, Informative)

          by Bombcar ( 16057 )
          Here is a link to the 2000 election [mob-rule.com] broken down by county. San Diego is the only heavily populated county that I can find that went for Bush.
        • "The Founding Father's felt that the state was the proper unit to give authority to. We are a collection of States who band together for protection and bargining rights when dealing with foreign nations, and to facilitate resolutions to internal conflict. That's what the Federal Government original was designed to do. Read up on the Federalist system sometime. State's have authority."

          Does anyone really believe that anymore? I sure don't.
      • Nowadays, however, all the reasons for it are gone. Your argument is rubbish - why are the electoral college voters more suited for judging character than the populace as a whole? I wouldn't trust most of the politicians I know with keys to my house, let alone keys to the country's vote.
        The average American isn't terribly bright. Statistically speaking, half of the population is dumber than the average American.

        Checks and balances.

    • Re:The Electoral College in Action (Score:4, Insightful)

      by thelenm ( 213782 ) <mthelen.gmail@com> on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @08:00PM (#10196142) Homepage Journal
      I think Godwin's Law may be applicable here. :-)

      Seriously though, since I've never been entirely clear exactly how electors are chosen, I just became interested enough to look it up [fec.gov]. Interesting that we as common voters are not casting our votes for president and vice president. We are casting them for electors. And the ballot has choices between "Electors for X" and "Electors for Y", whose names have been submitted by the various political parties.

      It is the electors' prerogative to vote their consciences. At the same time, if Mayor Robb was chosen as a Bush elector by the Republican Party, I assume it was with the understanding that he would vote for Bush. Either he's changed his mind since becoming an elector, or else he became a Bush elector without ever intending to vote for Bush. Either way, I'm not sure I agree with his decision to go back on the "understood" agreement that he would vote for Bush. But it is his decision.

      Actually, I like the way Maine and Nebraska choose their electors. Instead of each party choosing a slate of electors that everyone in the state votes for, there are two statewide electors plus one elector chosen from each Congressional district. I think the electors would be much more representative of the overall will of the people if they were chosen this way, instead of on a statewide basis.
      • Plus possibly the state of Colorado may change to vote on a percentage basis. Colorado has nine electoral votes, so it could go 5-4 or 6-3 for example. More here [google.com].
        • Doing so is dumb. Right now, Colorado is worth 9 "points" to either Bush or Kerry, so it is worthwhile for them to pay attention to Colorado.

          But if it goes to percentage, it will almost always be 5-4. Which means if you win Colorado, you get 1 more vote than if you lost it. So its worth becomes 1 instead of nine.
      • Actually, I like the way Maine and Nebraska choose their electors. Instead of each party choosing a slate of electors that everyone in the state votes for, there are two statewide electors plus one elector chosen from each Congressional district. I think the electors would be much more representative of the overall will of the people if they were chosen this way, instead of on a statewide basis.

        Not a bad idea overall, but remember that many states have districts that are gerrymandered to disproportionatel
    • t's usually in the best interests of the electors to go with the flow and approve who the voters choose, but it exists in case the next Hitler comes along so that even with a popular vote such a person would not come to power.

      So the next Hitler only has to bribe the voters in the electoral college and not the whole population? Interesting.

  • A deeper meaning? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jgaynor ( 205453 ) <jon@@@gaynor...org> on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @07:28PM (#10195882) Homepage
    I can see the obvious point he's trying to make (I hate bush) but could he also be trying to open people's eyes to the dangers of the entire electoral college system? By making such a wacky move he'll open the eyes of voters (regardless of party) to the fact that there's a slim possibility that their votes may not count after all . . .

    Hahah I said may not count - I almost forgot about last election!

    • Re:A deeper meaning? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Pyromage ( 19360 )
      The thing is, that's the entire point of the electoral college system: that the people *don't* get to elect a leader. The people only get to recommend them. There have been a handful of times already in history when the popular vote didn't go the way of the electoral vote. Not many, but it's happened.

      I don't think this will open any more eyes; any such closed eyes are probably on corpses. Everyone else is required to understand their government as part of high school.
      • The thing is, that's the entire point of the electoral college system: that the people *don't* get to elect a leader. The people only get to recommend them. There have been a handful of times already in history when the popular vote didn't go the way of the electoral vote. Not many, but it's happened.

        I believe you are mistaken. Presidents elected with a popular minority are not the result of electors ignoring the "recommendation". It is a results of the winner take all nature of determining which elect

  • The Electoral College (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Dimwit ( 36756 ) * on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @07:53PM (#10196093)
    The Electoral College, for those not familiar with the United States Presidental election system, is a particular group of people charged with electing the president.

    The electors are charged with voting for the President - the President is elected by this group of people (much like the Holy Roman Emperor was elected by a select group of German/Italian nobles). The people technically vote for electors.

    Electors are "pledged" to vote for who the people they represent voted for - but they aren't required. This (electors voting for someone other than the person the popular vote chose) has happened several times in the past, although it has never affected the outcome of the election.

    Several reasons have been postulated for the Electoral College system. One, it's a check on the stupidity of the people - make sure a dicatorial demagogue isn't elected. Another reason was that the Founding Fathers didn't trust the communications of their time. For example, if, after the popular election, it was found out that the President-elect was a serial killer, the electors could change their vote.

  • Yes, politics section is good - for all the political posts.

    1. I'm not in US, I don't really understand or care, really, who these people are. But I'm open to accept that Americans probably care about their politics. And they probably want it on their /. front page.

    2. A smart /. would have worked that out, may be from my "Time Zone / Daylight Savings Time" information - which puts me in GMT +10

    3. I go to my preferences and check off both "Politics" (did anyone notice there are two?

    4. As usual, politic

  • I call bullshit. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by ubiquitin ( 28396 ) *
    This isn't a "Republicans" article. By pretending to be fair and having both a Republicans and a Democrats section here, the clearly left-leaning editors can encourage their friends and berate their enemies to their hearts content. Seriously, this is my last /. politics post. I'm banning Democrats, Republicans, and Politics from my homepage. When I want real politics news and discussion I know where to get it. Not here.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • More should (Score:3, Interesting)

    by bluGill ( 862 ) on Wednesday September 08, 2004 @10:09PM (#10197089)

    I believe electors should not be allowed to decide who they will vote for before the national election. Each party can put electors on the ballot, but each elector runs separately. It would increase representation. It would allow you to vote mostly democrats, but vote against the anti-gun democrats, if that is how you wish to vote!

    After the polls close the electors gather together and come to an agreement (by the deadline in the constitution or it goes to congress). Since each electors is independent, electors can compromise on someone in the other party, but with important beliefs to shared with the other. (for example, a anti-abortion democrat)

    The electoral college is there because a good leader may have to piss people off.

  • "...a representative owes the People not only his industry, but his judgment, and he betrays them if he sacrifices it to their opinion."

    Edmond Burke of the British Parliament

    Quoted by Dr. Lyman Hall (GA), and thus was the Declaration of Independence signed, contrary to the vote in Georgia

  • The way it was intended (Score:3, Informative)

    by jgardn ( 539054 ) <jgardn@alumni.washington.edu> on Thursday September 09, 2004 @01:12AM (#10198064) Homepage Journal
    Go read the original constitution. Originally, people didn't vote for the president. In fact, the people didn't have a say on how the president was chosen.

    Article II, section 2, clause 2: Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.

    The legislature of a state chose the electors, not the people! The popular vote is just as important as the world-wide popular vote. It is irrelevant. All the states have delegated that responsibility to various systems. I believe Rhode Island and Maine appoint electors according to the proportion of the vote.

    The electors assembled in their own states and chose two people to be president, one of which must not be from their state. (That's why Cheney moved to Wyoming and claimed residency there - he could not be voted as the second because he was a Texas resident.) They had to send the number of votes for each person, signed and sealed, to the federal government. Whereupon the president of the senate opens the envelopes and reads the votes. The one with the majority is the president. The second place is vice-president, and president of the senate. If there is a tie and both have majority, then the house decides who is president and who is vice-president. If no one gets a majority, then the house chooses one from the top five candidates. In the case the house is tied, the senate breaks the tie.

    That's how the president was chosen at first. In fact, in the first election, nobody ran for president. However, George Washington won overwhelmingly. It was said that each of the electorates actually debated and took seriously their duty to choose a president. How I wish we elected representatives to choose the most important office in the land! And how I wish those people would debate and choose outside of the visibility of the people and legislatures the president!

    Eventually, we got rid of the "second place is vice-president" rule by amendment because it always meant that the president of the senate was in opposition to the president, and the government was constantly gridlocked due to that.

    When the Florida debacle occured, the Florida state legislature could've stepped in and changed the law permitting them to appoint electors without regard to the people's voice. That was their right under the constitution. Then they could've appointed their own electoral college and then sent them off to vote whichever way they pleased. However, because so few Americans have even read the simple document that our nation is built on, they refused to do so for fear of open rebellion. Instead, they allowed the courts to settle the matter.

    Now, go read that document! You have to understand what is in it and what is not, and it is an easy read for techies like us. If we forget what checks and balances are in there, and why they are there, we are doomed to end up like France, Germany, Russia, or China one day.

  • Cases of faithless voting (Score:3, Informative)

    by mabu ( 178417 ) * on Thursday September 09, 2004 @05:47AM (#10198857)
    Source: http://www.issues2000.org/askme/Faithless_Electors .htm

    The first clear case of the faithless elector happened in 1820, where one of James Monroe's electors voted for John Quincy Adams instead. Monroe carried every state in the Union, so the outcome was not affected.

    In this century, there have been 7 faithless electors. The first was in 1948, when Strom Thurmond was running for president on the Dixiecrat platform. Preston Parks, a Truman elector for Tennessee, voted for Thurmond, who was a distant third in the popular vote. W.F. Turner, an elector for Adlai Stevenson, voted in 1956 for a local judge from his home district.

    The first appearance of a faithless elector in a close election happened in the 1960 race between Nixon and Kennedy. An Oklahoma Kennedy elector named Henry D. Irwin voted instead for Harry F. Byrd, a senator from Virginia. Byrd ran as an independent and gained in addition all the 8 electoral votes from Mississippi and 6 of the 7 votes from Alabama. Reportedly Irwin, a southern Democrat, objected to Kennedy's civil rights policies. Although this election was very close, Irwin's vote did not affect the outcome.

    In 1968 however, the independent candidate's appeal and his corresponding electoral votes almost did change the outcome. Lloyd Bailey, a North Carolina Nixon elector, voted instead for George Wallace, who ran as an independent. In this case, Wallace gained a total of 46 electoral votes, which came close to preventing either Nixon or Humphrey from getting the number needed to win.

    In 1972, a Nixon elector named Roger L. McBride voted for the Libertarian candidate John Hospers. The publicity McBride received culminated in his own run for President in 1976, also as a Libertarian.

    A Ford elector from Washington, Mike Padden, voted in 1976 for Ronald Reagan. Reagan has lost the party's nomination to Ford. The most recent case was in 1988, where Margarette Leach, a Democratic elector from West Virginia, voted for Democratis Vice-Presidential candidate Lloyd Bentsen instead. She said, "it was nice to make a mark on history... I wish every year somebody... would make a statement and it would be heard."

    What happens when an elector is faithless? It turns out that only about half of the states have laws binding their electors to vote for the popular vote winner in their state. But wait, the situation is even worse. In the states that do bind their electors, either there is no penalty, or the penalties range from a fine ($1000 in Wisconsin) to conviction of a fourth-degree felony (New Mexico). And, although there are clear documented cases of faithless electors, no faithless elector has ever been punished. Of course, no faithless elector has ever changed the outcome of an election. So far.

  • This is a good thing (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Dunkirk ( 238653 ) <david@@@davidkrider...com> on Thursday September 09, 2004 @07:48AM (#10199191) Homepage
    The entire system of the electoral college was supposed to shield the decision of selecting a president from an ignorant public. In my opinion, the situation in Florida in 2000 was a perfect example of the sort of buffer it provides. I desperately wished that Florida's electoral college representatives would have just split their votes and given the odd one to Bush. That would have been a fair resolution to all the recounting. If it really was too close to call, then make it up in the electoral vote. If it was due to Republicans trying to disenfranchise black voters, if it was due to Democrats trying to disenfranchise military absentee voters, if it was due to Dan Rather calling the election for Gore an hour before the polls closed, whatever the case, make it up in the electoral vote. If all of these battleground states -- if ALL the states -- would cast their votes according to the percentage of the votes that go towards the candidates, we'd have a system that could still correct this sort of confusion, and would still get really close to a system of a popular vote. Don't let anyone fool you, we've had craziness in our voting all along. It's just that technology has provided both the insight to catch it and, more importantly, the means to communicate it immediately. The electoral college may be even more forward-thinking than we knew, but the people who make up the system are going to have to change their attitudes. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it's only tradition that keeps things the way they are. I don't know of any laws that force the delegates to cast their votes a certain way. If they think that the public of their state has made a mistake, it's their duty to cast their vote according to their conscience. (But then we get into a situation were we need to examine how those people get into the position of casting their vote. I have no idea how they are selected.)

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