# Electoral College weighting of votes by race **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 19, 2016, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450 "2016-11-19T18:55:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/21 "2016-11-20T14:23:57Z")
**septimus** and **excavating** , thank you for your responses. I expected a larger effect, and appreciate having my ignorance fought on the issue. Everyone who keeps bickering with the premise: keep on keepin’ on! ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/22 "2016-11-20T14:50:16Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > [snip] … Everyone who keeps bickering with the premise: keep on keepin’ on! Thank you for such a kind invitation … Using **septimus’** numbers, the Electoral Votes of 49 States strictly\* represent white voters, only in New Mexico does a minority control the vote. This just shows once again that democracy is the worst form of government (except for all the other forms). Disparity in representation is built into our particular system of government … we have one US Senator who represents 575,000 people (WY) and another US Senator who represents 38,000,000 people (CA) … each has exactly one vote … far and away the Electoral College is more proportional to population than the upper house of Congress. - = Both States that divide their EV’s are profoundly white (ME, NE) ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/23 "2016-11-20T15:02:53Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Only for a very peculiar definition of “power”. Consider that, under that same definition, if the “safe blue” states totaled 270 electoral votes, they would be considered to have no power whatsoever. It makes more sense to measure power by results, and to say that power consists in getting what you voted for (in which case, in that one-swing-state country, the swing state and whichever half of the other states it votes with in any given cycle share all of the power). I agree completely that my formulation doesn’t gybe with common definitions such as [Banzhaf power index - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banzhaf_power_index) and other competing indices. What I took to be the thrust of the OP’s question was neatly summarized in the post just above mine: > [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > Because of the winner-take-all way of allocating electoral votes, Black people in Alabama do not actually have the equivalent of ‘2.43 electoral votes’, it’s fairly certain for the foreseeable future that in presidential elections Alabama is always going to go in the opposite direction that most of its Black population would prefer. Black people in Alabama have essentially zero influence over selecting the president. IOW, the goal is trying to determine the degree to which a minority group, be it ethnic or be it political, is rendered voice_less_ by the EC process. So sort of an index not of power, but of powerlessness. My argument from an extreme example was that the ethnic makeup of the “guaranteed safe” states was immaterial. Yet they provide the majority of the EC votes. Recognizing that “guaranteed safe” is the political equivalent to the spherical cow and can obscure more than it illuminates. The OP’s assumption, which has been quantitatively disproven, was that the EC had the effect of disproportionately disempowering blacks. Not by design (\*pace \ ***jtur88** ), but by outcome. ---
**Author:** ![excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e8c25b/32.png) [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/excavating_for_a_mind)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/24 "2016-11-20T15:35:06Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > Targeting the OP’s premise, there is clearly not an intent, in the electoral college, to exercise racial discrimination. The point I believe that LHOD is working on is that the Supreme Court has determined that intent is irrelevant; if a practice can be shown to be discriminatory by effect, it violates anti-discriminatory laws. > [@](#): > > The founders didn’t intend for anybody to have a vote, except white male landowners, Not quite true. There is nothing to indicate that a free black landowner would not have been allowed to vote. > [@](#): > > and any effect on any hypothetical scenario of universal suffrage could not have been further from their minds. Surely, Jefferson et.al. did not say “Gee whiz, fellas, some day black women are going to be voting, and we should sneak in this electoral college thing as our last bastion of defense for our threatened privileged class.” > > In fact, absent the trajectory of industrilization, minority and low-income classes might have remained predominantly within the rural agricultural and natural resources sector, and the electoral college would actually favor blacks. Again, the intent of the EC was to prevent the office of President from being a popularity contest. The President was to be chosen by the States (which is why “winner take all” is so prevalent). The only reason the electors of each stare are chosen by popular vote is because that is what the people of the states have indicated they wanted. Past practices included having the States Legislatures choose the electors to represent the State in the EC. These practices were never found to be unfair, but just fell out of favor with the public. To argue that the EC is effectively discriminatory toward any particularly ethnic group (or even demographic) is like saying Wrigley Field is discriminating against black baseball players because baseball teams with more black members than the Cubs don’t play as many games there as the Cub do. That is, the opportunity for a black player to play at Wrigley Field would be less than that at other venues. It could be true, but it is truly irrelevant. The framers of the Constitution specifically did not want each voter in each state to have an equal voice in the choice of president, so the fact the the effect that some popular votes have more weight than others just reflects its design, not a defect. It’s a feature, not a bug. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/25 "2016-11-20T15:52:06Z")
I agree it’s a deliberate feature, not an inadvertent bug. But … Whether the feature’s benefits outweigh its drawbacks is a separate question. A separate question which may have different answers in 2016 than it did in 1790. And as always with the US constitution, changing it is so fraught and so difficult that any talk of change is simply debating theological issues that can [sub]almost[/sub] never be realized in the world. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/26 "2016-11-20T16:18:29Z")
> [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](#): > > The point I believe that LHOD is working on is that the Supreme Court has determined that intent is irrelevant; if a practice can be shown to be discriminatory by effect, it violates anti-discriminatory laws… Except that a claim cannot be made that a constitutional provision violates a law, if that’s where you are going with that. The Constitution trumps any law. ---
**Author:** ![excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e8c25b/32.png) [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/excavating_for_a_mind)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/27 "2016-11-20T16:37:48Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > I… > And as always with the US constitution, changing it is so fraught and so difficult that any talk of change is simply debating theological issues that can [sub]almost[/sub] never be realized in the world. Particularly with our two-party system when each side is trying to make sure they can be the most divisive. ---
**Author:** ![excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e8c25b/32.png) [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/excavating_for_a_mind)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/28 "2016-11-20T16:43:45Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Except that a claim cannot be made that a constitutional provision violates a law, if that’s where you are going with that. The Constitution trumps any law. Well, it wasn’t where I was going (if I understand your comment correctly), but it is the point being made in the \*Observer \*opinion article linked to in the OP. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/29 "2016-11-20T16:46:48Z")
> [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](#): > > The point I believe that LHOD is working on is that the Supreme Court has determined that intent is irrelevant; if a practice can be shown to be discriminatory by effect, it violates anti-discriminatory laws. Are you sayng that the entire Constitution can be held to be null and void, if the SC can be shown that it’s application can be used to discriminatory effect? That anti-discrimination clauses trump everything else in the document? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/30 "2016-11-20T16:50:41Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Except that a claim cannot be made that a constitutional provision violates a law, if that’s where you are going with that. The Constitution trumps any law. Of course. I wasn’t getting at that. I wasn’t getting at the intent of the founders. I wasn’t getting at what should happen next. I could have asked all those questions, of course, because I know the words for them. Furthermore, I know where Great Debates is, and I know that such questions are properly asked (and discussed!) over there. I posted here because, as I said in the OP, I wanted a mathematical answer to a mathematical question. Why folks feel the need to figure out some other question that I could have asked instead is beyond me. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/31 "2016-11-20T17:05:42Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Of course. I wasn’t getting at that. I wasn’t getting at the intent of the founders. I wasn’t getting at what should happen next. I could have asked all those questions, of course, because I know the words for them. Furthermore, I know where Great Debates is, and I know that such questions are properly asked (and discussed!) over there. I posted here because, as I said in the OP, I wanted a mathematical answer to a mathematical question. > > Why folks feel the need to figure out some other question that I could have asked instead is beyond me. Since I was responding to a different poster, why would you think I was talking about you? In fact, it was the poster I was responding to who opined about what you might be getting at. At any rate, the whole point of the conditional “if” is to acknowledge uncertainty. But the way that poster left things in his/her post, it sort of left things dangling. Why even mention a law that isn’t applicable to this situation? I thought clarification was in order, and so I clarified. It’s not about you. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/32 "2016-11-20T17:32:22Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Since I was responding to a different poster, why would you think I was talking about you? > … > It’s not about you. That poster was talking about my intentions. I was agreeing with you, and then responding that those weren’t my intentions. That’s all :). ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/33 "2016-11-20T17:49:10Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > That poster was talking about my intentions. I was agreeing with you, and then responding that those weren’t my intentions. That’s all :). Oh, OK. It would have been a lot clearer if you had quoted the poster you were talking about rather than me. That’s all. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e8c25b/32.png) [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/excavating_for_a_mind)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/34 "2016-11-20T20:42:01Z")
LHOD linked to an article in the OP that suggested that the Electoral College system needed to be challenged in the Supreme Court on the basis that it can result in the voters in some States having a greater influence on the outcome than those of other states. The way the OP was written, asking if the system could be shown to systemically reduce the influence of African-American voters, I falsely assumed that if a bias should be shown, LHOD might want to see if that could give support to a legal challenge. Other posters appeared to make a similar assumption. I apologize for my incorrect assumption. It appears the OP was just to see if a systemic bias was introduced by the EC for purely academic reasons. As has been beaten to death in this thread, while the EC does result in not all votes being equal in the selection of the President, there does not appear to be any significant bias against African-Americans. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/35 "2016-11-20T21:27:56Z")
As an aside, I’m rather surprised that it does come out to be so fair (in that sense, at least), given all of the demographic patterns among race and state size. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/36 "2016-11-20T21:33:40Z")
> [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](#): > > It appears the OP was just to see if a systemic bias was introduced by the EC for purely academic reasons. Well, no. But my reasons are not properly the subject of a GQ thread, I believe, whereas the straight-up facts are, which is what I was going after here. Asked and answered, unless someone sees a specific criticism of septimus’s data or methods. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/37 "2016-11-20T21:35:45Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > As an aside, I’m rather surprised that it does come out to be so fair (in that sense, at least), given all of the demographic patterns among race and state size. nm ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/38 "2016-11-20T21:52:37Z")
To be clear, I didn’t mean to suggest that there’s some deliberate effort to bias the electoral college one way or another. It’s just that, **septimus** ’ results seem to say that overall, the racial proportions are the same in large states as in small states, and it’s surprising that it would be so close. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2016, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450/39 "2016-11-20T22:25:12Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > To be clear, I didn’t mean to suggest that there’s some deliberate effort to bias the electoral college one way or another. It’s just that, **septimus** ’ results seem to say that overall, the racial proportions are the same in large states as in small states, and it’s surprising that it would be so close. It shouldn’t be at all surprising. The Three-Fifths Compromise was specifically intended to give greater weight to the Southern states by letting the predominantly black African slaves count as 60% of a vote for the purposes of assigning Electoral College votes and allocating representatives in the US Congress. After the Great Migration of the 1920s going through the 1960s there was a greater geographical distribution but primarily concentrated in urban industrial areas, so you really have a few states with a lot of blacks, but states like Illinois, Michigan, and New York that are dominated by large population centers (therefore having less influence on the Electoral College vote count), and then many Southern states with lower populations but much higher proportion of blacks (high weighting in the Electoral College vote). That doesn’t mean there is an even distirbution, as a [demographic map](http://www.censusscope.org/us/map_nhblack.html) will show. The degree of actual influence that black voters may have, even assuming that they vote in a monolithic block despite microdemographic differences in region, age, and education, has to be considered in the context of how significant voter participation is in comparison to the voting population. A mapping of black Congresspeople past and present will give some notion of the representation actually provided (assuming that you feel that the demographics of Congress should roughly match that of the country, although to be fair, there is no particular reason that race should be the key factor in defining adequate representation). Stranger [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/electoral-college-weighting-of-votes-by-race/772450.md?page=1)