Outcome reversed. The difference in approaches to climate change alone justifies that AFAIAC. Hillary would honor the Paris accords, while Trump would withdraw the U.S. from them, and who knows what even a ‘moderate’ Republican like Mitt Romney might do.
And certainly we’d have another few years of government stalemate under Hillary, but that’s been the case since 2010 anyway, and there are things worse than stalemate.
Finally, if a ‘faithless Electoral College’ threw the election back to Hillary, that would get the GOP to support an EC fix, which would be great.
The worst case scenario is the Republicans realize they’ve been foolish in spending so much resources on gerrymandering, voter ID laws, and rigging voter machines. All they need to do is get a few dozen Electors in their pocket and they can appoint anyone they want as President forever.
“In this thread, we’ll sidestep for a moment the issues of legality or the sheer unlikelihood of anyone but Trump being elected POTUS when the ballots are cast on 12/19; instead I would like to ask* what outcome Dopers would personally prefer to see.”
*
While the Constitution doesn’t direct their votes, the states do. Even the states that don’t have laws to punish faithless Electors still expect that they’ll vote in the manner indicated by the state’s voters.
And I’ve defended the basic structure of the Electoral College in another recent thread. I’m not bothered by the Constitution empowering independent votes in theory, because that gives states options that aren’t enabled by a simple numerical system. Still, I don’t think the writers of the Constitution themselves wanted the Electoral College to say “Nope, the people were dumb. We like Hillary.”
I disagree. As you quoted, the Constitution says “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors”. That clearly says the state legislatures can enact laws on Electors.
There’s no equivalent text that says Electors are the individuals designated to choose who to vote for. The Constitution just says the Electors cast votes.
And it’s not as if the authors were unaware of the distinction. Note that in the same paragraph, the Constitution says four times that Congress chooses a candidate if that duty falls on them. So that’s a strong argument that Electors, unlike members of Congress, weren’t intended to make a choice in their votes. Their role was to convey the votes as directed by their state legislature.
My understanding is that each state has two groups of Electors on stand-by. One group is directed to vote for Hillary Clinton and one group is directed to vote for Donald Trump. And the state appoints whichever group is committed to the candidate who got the most votes in the state (with some adjustments in Nebraska and Maine).
That clearly says that it’s up state legislatures to direct the manner in which electors are appointed. It doesn’t say jack about states directing how they vote.
The third option might as well say “I’m a sore loser”, because that option is sour grapes. Trump won; the EC should vote accordingly.
I thought and still think Obama was thoroughly unqualified to be POTUS, but at no point did I or would I have ever wanted the EC to vote in Romney instead. If that happened, you would see the end of the Republic.
So - once and for all - is the EC meant to be a rubber-stamp, or a constitutional last-line-of-defense against an undesirable POTUS? Serious question, not rhetorical.
I think mostly rubber stamp, but a last ditch back up should something really horrible be revealed between the Nov General Election and the EC vote. Such as massive Voter fraud by the Russians. or a untimely death, etc.
I want to stress I think that is very unlikely, but also not entirely impossible.
So barring that, yes the EC should rubber stamp, altho a protest vote or two would not be totally out of line.
The Founding Fathers had many different intentions and aims. Some of them promoted the creation of the EC on that basis. Others didn’t. It wasn’t created to be a deliberative body, since it never meets. The details were left up to the individual states, who made a clear and unanimous decision to make the EC as close to a rubber stamp as possible. Why does their decision count for less than the Founders?
And who cares what they meant anyway? Thomas Jefferson wasn’t a Founding Father (He was in France when the Constitution was drafted.) but he was a founder of the country nonetheless, and he warned against letting the dead hand of previous generations dictate our governance. He wanted the Constitution replaced every generation or so, by violent revolution if necessary (at least when he was a young revolutionary).
But I think Jefferson was an overrated demagogue who spouted radical egalitarian rhetoric when it helped his cause and turned around and denied t when it didn’t. I say to hell with him and the Founding Fathers. We should use the tools they gave us and any others we can find or devise for ourselves to make the world better for people today and in the future. Let the dead take care of the dead.
I say that they all go into the Thunderdome and the last one out gets to decide. I mean its been a shitshow for almost 2 years now, at least that shitshow would be somewhat interesting.
It seemed to me no matter who wins, we are screwed anyway, but I’m not the most political guy. I voted for other (Thunderdome)
To be honest, nobody knows what the original intent of the Constitution’s authors was. (Antonin Scalia knew but he’s dead.) The text says the Electors vote. That can be interpreted that they choose who to vote for or that they cast the votes that the state legislatures have directed them to cast.
I will point out that the practice of having the Electors follow directions was instituted from the very beginning. And several of the people who wrote the Constitution were still alive and didn’t protest this.
On the other hand, faithless Electors have been around from the beginning too (although they’ve never changed the outcome of an election).
