I read in the Washington Post this morning about the concept of “faithless” electors, that is, electors who vote against their commitment as determined by the popular vote in their state. I also read that the electors’ vote-casting in December is largely ceremonial.
So say Bush wins tomorrow with 270 electoral votes to Gore’s 268. What if, between now and December, five electors get some sort of pangs of conscience and change their minds? So when they open the envelope in December, Gore gets 273 and Bush gets 268. What happens? Is that vote binding?
If the situation that you discussed above happens, then Al Gore will have gotten enough electoral votes, and he will become the president-elect. The Electoral College vote is not only binding, it’s the only thing that is binding. If 270 electors said “We want to vote for Olentzero!”, everybody would look at you when they started playing “Hail to the Chief”
We’ll know if there’s been a rogue elector long before they open the ballots on January 6. The electors vote in public and their ballots are not secret.
Tune in on December 18 or go to your state capital and watch the electors do their job.
Much as I appreciate the flattery, Captain Amazing, they’ll have to wait until I’m 35 to vote me in. Check back with me in 2004.
Thanks for the answer, though. I was pretty sure that’s how it would happen but you’re never sure. And all the sites I found said “faithless electors have never changed the election”. Would love to see that one trashed!
It could happen, but I guarantee you it would only happen once. As soon as an election is “stolen,” the laws will be re-written to ensure that such a thing never happens again.
You know, there is also the question of… stupidity. If you look at Dave Liep’s Election Atlas for the year 1988, you’ll notice this fine footnote:
** One Dukakis Elector from West Virginia cast her vote for Lloyd Bensten (President) and Michael Dukakis (VP).*
That apparent mistake merely added to the long list of West Virginia jokes, but in an election as close as this one could be, it could be just enough to toss the election into Congress. And you know which way they’re going to go.
I don’t think the Bentsen/Dukakis switcheroo in WV was a mistake: I think the elector decided to make a statement with her vote, saying that she would’ve preferred Bentsen as the presidential nominee, with Duke as his running mate.
A NY Times article about the electoral college vote in 1988 said that the 1988 WV reversed electoral vote was by one Margarette Leach of Huntington, WV. She said she reversed the slots to protest the existence of the electoral college.