The Founders Knew Best
Monday, November 3rd, 2008 By David Owsiany
Every four years, a debate heats up about the Electoral College and its primary role in electing the president of the U.S. In 2000, while the post-election haggling continued between the presidential campaigns of George W. Bush and Al Gore, I wrote this Buckeye Institute commentary on the historical importance and enduring value of the Electoral College. The founders’ view was that the Electoral College would ensure against the election of a regional candidate who did not represent the broad values of the nation and preserve a significant role for the states in selecting the chief executive. Some have proposed abolishing the Electoral College but to do so would require amending the U.S. Constitution, which is unlikely to happen. Accordingly, several half-baked schemes have been hatched in recent years to undermine the founders’ intentions without actually abolishing the Electoral College.
One prominent such scheme is the National Popular Vote (NPV) plan. Legislation was introduced in Ohio earlier this year to implement such a plan here in the buckeye state. The plan is to create an “agreement among the states to elect the president by national poplar vote.” States would join an interstate compact to elect the president based upon the national popular vote by agreeing to cast their electoral votes for the winner of the national popular vote for president. So, for example, under the NPV plan if fully adopted and implemented, even if a significant majority of a state’s voters voted for candidate A, all of that state’s electoral votes would still go to candidate B, if candidate B won the national popular vote. Effectively this plan will end any role for the states in selecting the president and would encourage presidential candidates to focus their efforts only on those states and regions with high population densities. The Cato Institute recently published a critique of NPV emphasizing, among other things, the value of the current system and the founders’ view of preserving the states’ role in selecting America’s chief executive.
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:12 pm
It is sometimes asserted that “the voters would rebel” if a state’s electoral votes were awarded to a candidate who did not carry their own state. This argument is based on the incorrect premise that the voters are devoted and attached to the current system. In fact, the opposite is true. 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). The recent Washington Post, Kaiser Family Foundation, and Harvard University poll shows 72% support for direct nationwide election of the President. This national result is similar to recent polls in Vermont (75%), Maine (71%), Arkansas (74%), California (69%), Connecticut (73%), Massachusetts (73%), Michigan (70%), Missouri (70%), North Carolina (62%), and Rhode Island (74%). In short, the public believes that the candidate that receives the most votes should get elected
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Because so few of the 22 small and medium-small states are closely divided battleground states in presidential elections, the current system actually shifts power from voters in the small and medium-small states to voters in a handful of big states. The New York Times reported early in 2008 (May 11, 2008) that both major political parties were already in agreement that there would be at most 14 battleground states in 2008 (involving only 166 of the 538 electoral votes). In other words, three-quarters of the states were to be ignored under the current system in the 2008 election. Michigan (17 electoral votes), Ohio (20), Pennsylvania (21), and Florida (27) contain over half of the electoral votes that will matter in 2008 (85 of the 166 electoral votes). There are only three battleground states among the 22 small and medium-small states (i.e., New Hampshire, New Mexico, and Nevada). These three states contain only 14 of the 166 electoral votes. Anyone concerned about the relative power of big states and small states should realize that the current system shifts power from voters in the small and medium-small states to voters in a handful of big states.
The fact that the small states are disadvantaged by the current system has also been recognized by prominent officials from smaller states. In a 1979 Senate speech, Senator Henry Bellmon (R–Oklahoma) described how his views on the Electoral College had changed while he had served as National Campaign Director for Richard Nixon and a member of the American Bar Association’s commission studying electoral reform.
“While the consideration of the electoral college began — and I am a little embarrassed to admit this — I was convinced, as are many residents of smaller States, that the present system is a considerable advantage to less populous States such as Oklahoma … As the deliberations of the American Bar Association Commission proceeded and as more facts became known, I came to the realization that the present electoral system does not give an advantage to the voters from the less populous States. Rather, it works to the disadvantage of small State voters who are largely ignored in the general election for President.”
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:16 pm
Evidence as to how a nationwide presidential campaign would be run can be found by examining the way presidential candidates currently campaign inside battleground states. Inside Ohio or Florida, the big cities do not receive all the attention. And, the cities of Ohio and Florida certainly do not control the outcome in those states. Because every vote is equal inside Ohio or Florida, presidential candidates avidly seek out voters in small, medium, and large towns. The itineraries of presidential candidates in battleground states (and their allocation of other campaign resources in battleground states) reflect the political reality that every gubernatorial or senatorial candidate in Ohio and Florida already knows–namely that when every vote is equal, the campaign must be run in every part of the state.
Further evidence of the way a nationwide presidential campaign would be run comes from national advertisers who seek out customers in small, medium, and large towns of every small, medium, and large state. A national advertiser does not write off Indiana or Illinois merely because a competitor makes more sales in those particular states. Moreover, a national advertiser enjoying an edge over its competitors in Indiana or Illinois does not stop trying to make additional sales in those states. National advertisers go after every single possible customer, regardless of where the customer is located.