Surveys, polls, what have you, seem remarkably consistent that a bit over 60% of Americans want the popular vote overall to determine the winner of the Presidential election. The 60+ percent has to, mathematically, include a significant number of Trump voters, so…
I think it possible for a state by state change, a new law in each state that agrees that the electoral votes of the state will be given to the winner of the national popular vote, that change could actually happen.
Would traditional red states join in? Maybe not, but states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina and many others where the Trump vote was well less than 60% might actually give it consideration and might put it to a referendum. Then, if enough swing states act to change their rules, whether or not the strongly red states agree will be moot.
“Gallup, which found that 63 percent of adults in 2013 wanted to get rid of the Electoral College, and that a majority of Americans have wanted to abolish it every time they asked the question, going back to 1967.”
Even those states who happen to be strongly anti-Federalist and who believe they are validly entitled to have one senator for each 50% of their small population by the Constitution should be in favor of allowing other states to determine for themselves how their electoral votes are cast.
Then, of course, a state could change their minds, it is up to them one year to the next whether to go with popular overall or popular within their state…an argument why a constitutional amendment would be preferable, but, face it, such an amendment is highly unlikely.
The National Popular Vote Compact has been underway for a decade, and has not collected any major groundswell of support. Also, it does not “get rid” of the Electoral College. The only way to do that is via a Constitutional amendment.
There have already been a number of Electoral College threads in the forum.
The only way forward that seems realistic is for each state to decide whether to cast their electoral votes for the national or the state popular vote winner. The electoral college remains, no amendment is required, the overall will of the people ratified.
actually, you don’t seem to understand that I am completely aware that eliminating the electoral college is not likely, but it is also unnecessary. The compact you refer to is also unnecessary. It should simply be up to each state to decide how to cast the votes. It doesn’t have to rely on any sort of country wide agreement.
Any movement towards a popular vote system now will be readily quashed once people in the states with an electoral advantage consider the idea in the actual political arena.
I’m not following your arguments. Each state does decide how to cast their electoral votes. And 48 of the states have decided that it’s a winner-take-all system: whoever gets the most votes in their state gets all of that state’s electoral votes.
What exactly are you proposing when you say “up to each state to decide how to cast the votes”?
Also, the statement that you are aware that eliminating the electoral college is not likely but unnecessary is inconsistent with the thread title: “strictly about getting rid of the electoral college”.
That poll apparently breaks down the voters by Democrats, Republicans and independents. But that’s not the real issue, it seems to me. The breakdown I would like to see is by states. Is that 63% number constant in all 50 states? Or is there regional or state variation? For instance, do the voters in North Dakota and Rhode Island favour abolishing the electoral college by 63% margins?
I can’t tell for sure, but I think the OP is assuming it’s true in all states, hence his bewilderment as to why all the states don’t act the way he things they should act if a majority wants to use the popular vote for president. But I’d be shocked if that number was representative in the smaller states.
It is up to each state today to decide on the system of how to select their electors. Most states decided to do it in a winner-takes-all way. A couple decided to divide them by the congressional district.
I’ve been trying to understand the EC and it’s relevance today. Not much luck. Oddly, this Snopes article kind of helped. Thought I would drop it here.
My point was a simple one. The states have the right to decide how to have the electoral votes cast. Overall, in two decently devised and non-partisan polls, 62 or 63 percent of all Americans, country-wide, want to use the national popular vote as the method of determining the president.
No, I don’t suspect that small states, enjoying exaggerated power by virtue of the constitution’s method of awarding electoral votes, will want to adopt this method. It doesn’t matter much because they were going to mostly go one way in any event.
The main thing to understand is that in states where 48% of the people voted for one candidate and that candidate received all the electoral votes, 60% of the people may also poll that they want the national total to be presumptive of how their state will cast their electoral votes. Those folks should have a chance to change their state’s way of awarding electoral votes, don’t you agree? Put it to a vote in each state and let the chips fall as they may?
Of course, conservatives don’t want this, it would ruin them. They never win the popular vote unless they also win the electoral vote. Democrats should be all in favor.
But, as long as state legislatures are overwhelmingly controlled by Republicans, and, until the court’s recent rulings that redistricting cannot be performed with political party affiliation of the voters considered, it ain’t gonna happen very often.
