Republican Elector in West Virginia says he might not vote for Bush

Great Debates
1

Richie Robb, mayor of South Charleston, West Virginia, is one of the five Republican electors who have been chosen to represent WV in the Electoral College if Bush wins the state’s popular vote in November. But he says he might refuse to vote for Bush. From the Charleston Daily Mail, September 8, 2004 (http://www.dailymail.com/news/News/2004090817/):

This points up with one of the little anomalies in our Electoral College system: We tend to forget this, but when we cast a vote for president, we actually are voting for a slate of partisan electors who are competing for the right to represent our state in the EC. Even the minor-party candidates, if they get on the ballot at all, have a slate of electors picked out and filed withe the state’s secretary of state. And once elected, these electors, whose names most people don’t even know, are autonomous (if temporary) constitutional officers in their own right. Any elector might turn out to be a “faithless elector.” It all depends on how careful the state’s party organization is in choosing them. Can anything be done about this? Is this yet another reason why the Electoral College is an outmoded system?

2

BTW: According to http://www.electoral-vote.com, West Virginia is a “Weak Bush” state: The most recent poll there, done by Zogby on September 3, shows 40% support for Kerry, 49% for Bush, 2% for Nader. So this is not purely an academic question – there is a better than even chance that Bush will win the WV popular vote, and Robb will be sent to join the EC in Washington (or wherever it meets), and if things are really close, who knows, his vote might be decisive.

3

I really would hate it if Bush won this November, and I’ll confess my initial gut-level reaction to hearing this was a cheer. But really it’s a disenfranchisement. It’s been done before, and recently at that (I’m pretty sure a Dukakis elector voted for Lloyd Bentsen in 1998, for instance), but never in such a way as to modify the outcome of the election.

They should pass a national law requiring the states to have a non-arbitrary and formulaic way of determining how its electoral votes will be cast, and binding the electors to voting in that fashion.

4

Uhh, make that 1988. :smack:

5

Is it too late for the republican party organization in West Virginia to boot him out and replace him with a tame party apparatchik? I thought elector positions were invariably given to boring party servants to avoid this sort of thing.

6

I want Kerry to win. However, if Bush legally wins West Viriginia, he should get all the electoral votes from that state. The DC delegate who refused to vote for Gore acted dishonorably in my opinion. That 2000 election was so goofy and confusing that all the Gore votes should have been cast for Gore. When the electoral college met in December, there was no 100% guarantee that Florida’s votes would not survive the challenge in the House of Represenatives.

The elector who voted Bentsen/Dukakis didn’t accomplish anything. I do remember watching the votes being counted and seeing a surprised look on George H.W. Bush’s and the House clerk.

7

But that would be unconstitutional. From the U.S. Constitution, Article II, Section 1 (with comments from the Encarta – http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761569008_3____69/Constitution_of_the_United_States.html#s69)::

So the task of choosing electors clearly is left up to the states, specifically the state legislatures. Electors are now directly elected by the state’s voters on a winner-take-all basis, but that is a product of state-level legislation, not a federal constitutional requirement, and the state legislatures could take back the power at any time. In 2000 the Republican-controlled Florida legislature threatened to cut the knot of the popular-vote deadlock by simply appointing a Republican slate of electors – the Supreme Court’s intervention rendered that unnecessary, but, if they had done it, it would not have been unconstitutional. And there is nothing in the Constitution which could be read as authorizing federal legislation to the effect that an elector must vote a certain way. Even state legislation to that effect might be unconstitutional.

8

It’s another good reason to get rid of the electoral college. See here for a more detailed analysis.

9

Bah! There are already enough laws and regulations — millions of them in fact. The whole Byzantine web of contradictory and overlapping dicta constitutes a morass of quicksand justice in which the wealthy can buy a pole to grab onto while the poor must flail until they suffocate. I think this is wonderful news! Hurray for this elector, who is unwilling to allow a majority mob to break the knees of our beloved liberty! :slight_smile:

10

One, it is my opinion that any argument that serves to suggest representative democracy is reasonable will have a pretty impossible time suggesting that EC votes are unreasonable on their face, except by assertion.

Two, how the state’s EC votes are cast are a state matter, as has been mentioned. This possibility has been around since the EC’s inception, just like a politician can run on one platform but vote on another. There is very little accountability in democracy. We could legislate it, but then we might as well legislate electors away. If we’re going to do that, we might as well do away with EC votes. But if EC voting is intrinsically so lopsided, so is our method of representation in Congress, so we might as well do something about that (not that certain parties at the dope haven’t suggested that).

11

If I’m reading the electoral vote page linked in BrainGluttons post correctly, then if all the state go the way they are currently leaning, and all the undecideds (Florida, Maine and Nevada) go to Bush, a 269-269 tie would result, giving the election to Bush via the house of reps unless the West Virginia elector still has the balls to abstain/vote third party (which I realize is still pretty unlikely) in which case Kerry wins 269-268.

Their was an uproar in 2000 when the election was basically decided by nine people, in 2004 it might be decided by the choice of one person.

12

And God bless him.

13

Look, would you care to expand that statement into something along the lines of a general principle? If a “majority mob” should not choose our president, then who should?

14

If it goes to the house Bush will get re-elected.

However, it is more than possible that we could see a Bush/Edwards administration. Can Bush then replace Edwards? What power does the president have over the vice president? Fascinating questions. And, far too probable (though still unlikely) for my tastes. We’d have riots in the streets.

15

Since the fact that some states allow electors to do this is in no way inherent in the EC, it makes no sense to say this is a reason to scrap that system.

16

But it is inherent in the EC, John. Review the relevant clause of the Constution, posted above. It says, “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors.” It also says, “The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves.” In other words, the legislatures choose the electors, or direct the means of choosing them, but the electors vote. And it wouldn’t be voting at all if they weren’t free to vote however they wished. I think any state law saying the state’s electors would have vote a certain way would be ruled unconstitutional.

17

Both the president and vice-president are constitutional positions. I seriously doubt that Bush would have a constitutional leg to stand on if the Senate chose Edwards over Cheney.

18

The way I see it, Kerry only wins in your situation if the elector abstains, thereby having a majority of the votes, 269-268. If the elector votes third party, 269-268-1 is not a majority and it goes to the House.

19

Why not let each man give or withhold his consent as he pleases, and select for himself that government which he believes is most likely to secure his safety and happiness? The general principle is the Principle of Noncoercion.

20

[hijack]I thought Bush should have, in 2000, requested that Florida’s electors, who he was awarded, not cast their votes for him, but abstain or vote for a third candidate. The election would have gone to the house, he would have been made president, and a huge ugly mess that left millions of people feeling disenfranchised would have been avoided. I, for one, would have felt much less screwed by how my president came to power.[/hijack]