# Why not add one more seat to the House of Representatives to avoid a tied Electoral vote? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [October 2, 2012, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517 "2012-10-02T20:40:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![MilTan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@MilTan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MilTan)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/21 "2012-10-03T15:56:30Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > All three of those votes would reliably go to one party. That’s a problem if you’re the other one. That didn’t stop DC from getting 3 EVs, even though it has never in its history given those EVs to the Republican ticket. ---
**Author:** ![CapnPitt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/edb3f5/32.png) [@CapnPitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CapnPitt)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/22 "2012-10-03T16:45:33Z")
> [@Lord\_Feldon](#): > > Couldn’t the electoral college also cause issues where none would have existed? I’d think that a 500,000 vote lead nationwide would be much harder to challenge than a 537 vote lead in Florida. Harder to challenge than 537 votes in Florida, sure. But according to wikipedia, 131,393,990 votes were cast nationally in 2008. 500,000 votes nationally would account for roughly four tenths of one percent of the total votes cast which is well under the standard automatic recount trigger of one percent. And you’d have to recount district by district instead of having the possible problem contained to one state. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/23 "2012-10-03T19:26:22Z")
> [@CapnPitt](#): > > 500,000 votes nationally would account for roughly four tenths of one percent of the total votes cast which is well under the standard automatic recount trigger of one percent. The standard what of what now? I think a lot of states go by the half-a-percent standard. And that’s for an automated recount, not a manual one. Anyway, stats tells us that as the number of votes goes up, the confidence can go _up_ in rejecting the null hypothesis (the null hypothesis here would be that the winner did not get more votes than the loser). In other words, the bigger your collection of data, the percentage difference that would cast doubt on the outcome is much _lower_. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/24 "2012-10-03T23:45:55Z")
> [@CapnPitt](#): > > Harder to challenge than 537 votes in Florida, sure. But according to wikipedia, 131,393,990 votes were cast nationally in 2008. 500,000 votes nationally would account for roughly four tenths of one percent of the total votes cast which is well under the standard automatic recount trigger of one percent. And you’d have to recount district by district instead of having the possible problem contained to one state. The fair way would be to pick X number of counties/cities/precincts and just recount those. If Z% is wrong, expand the number of precincts that are recounted. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/25 "2012-10-04T01:06:36Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > All three of those votes would reliably go to one party. That’s a problem if you’re the other one. You do not know that. We in the Island do NOT vote based on Rep/Dem or Con/Lib. ---
**Author:** ![CapnPitt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/edb3f5/32.png) [@CapnPitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CapnPitt)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/26 "2012-10-04T03:32:20Z")
> [@bup](#): > > The standard what of what now? > > I think a lot of states go by the half-a-percent standard. And that’s for an automated recount, not a manual one. > > Anyway, stats tells us that as the number of votes goes up, the confidence can go _up_ in rejecting the null hypothesis (the null hypothesis here would be that the winner did not get more votes than the loser). In other words, the bigger your collection of data, the percentage difference that would cast doubt on the outcome is much _lower_. Even if we go by a half percent standard, 500K votes would still be under that. And regardless of the sample size, you might get the American people to believe a lot of things, but you won’t get them to believe in math (no matter how right it might be). There would be demand for every vote to be counted. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/27 "2012-10-04T03:45:33Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > The Electoral College system mutes these disputes. Nobody is going to worry if a few hundred votes were stolen if Hicksville County if they lost the state by ten thousand votes overall - the issue of whether you got 200 votes or 700 votes in Hicksville isn’t an issue that would change the outcome of the election. The only time people worry about fraud is when the results for the state were close enough that the fraud might have tipped the balance. > > If there was no Electoral College and every vote in the country counted towards the total, you’d see the number of challenges explode. There would be hundreds or even thousands of challenges in every Presidential election because each vote would be worth fighting for. You’d never settle all these cases between November and January. And think of the political fallout if every election was being fought by months of court battles. The fact that we pretend that “a little fraud doesn’t matter” encourages fraud. I think this an argument for direct elections. Make every vote count, count every vote, and do not tolerate fraud–do not pretend it doesn’t matter. ---
**Author:** ![BigAppleBucky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigapplebucky/32/178_2.png) [@BigAppleBucky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigAppleBucky)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/28 "2012-10-04T03:46:56Z")
> [@Happy\_Lendervedder](#): > > But that would open it up to more ties on votes on the House floor. > > The electoral college thing is only an issue every four years, and even then, when’s the last time it was really an issue? 1824? Agreed. But wasn’t 1876 pretty messy? Both 2000 and 2004 could have been as well with very few changes. As a second choice (to no change at all) I like the idea of giving Puerto Rico a vote, or three. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/29 "2012-10-04T06:55:20Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Give Puerto Rico 3 electoral votes. Now there’s 541 total, but no change in Congress. Problem solved. This is something I’ve never grasped. Why didn’t Puerto Rico and Guam also get the “DC treatment” when DC was granted electoral votes? They are no less terrirtories of the US than DC is and none of the three is a state. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 9:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/30 "2012-10-04T09:03:36Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > They are no less terrirtories of the US than DC is and none of the three is a state. They kind of are. They’re territories of the US, but since they’re not incorporated territories they’re not actually _part_ of the United States in the way that DC is (the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment, for example, applies in DC but not Puerto Rico, although IIRC federal law makes it so that there’s no or little difference practically). By the 1960s, the District of Columbia was the only permanently-inhabited part of the United States that didn’t have statehood. Think of it like a tool shed. Yeah, you own it, and the stuff in it is yours, but it’s something separate. DC is more like a closet. It’s indisputably part of your house, but still not a room or anything. ---
**Author:** ![Scholar\_Beardpig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de053/32.png) [@Scholar\_Beardpig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scholar_Beardpig)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/31 "2012-10-04T21:46:14Z")
> [@Lord\_Feldon](#): > > They kind of are. They’re territories of the US, but since they’re not incorporated territories they’re not actually _part_ of the United States in the way that DC is (the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment, for example, applies in DC but not Puerto Rico, although IIRC federal law makes it so that there’s no or little difference practically). By the 1960s, the District of Columbia was the only permanently-inhabited part of the United States that didn’t have statehood. > > Think of it like a tool shed. Yeah, you own it, and the stuff in it is yours, but it’s something separate. DC is more like a closet. It’s indisputably part of your house, but still not a room or anything. Also, it probably doesn’t help DC is a little sliver of land given up voluntarily by two existing states, whereas Guam and Puerto Rico are the product of military conquest. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517/32 "2012-10-04T23:30:36Z")
The issue is not really a tie but rather a third party that sucks off enough votes to throw it into the House. A few more Wallace votes in Florida, Tennessee and North Carolina in 1968 would have done that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-add-one-more-seat-to-the-house-of-representatives-to-avoid-a-tied-electoral-vote/636517.md?page=1)