politics
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
view the rest of the comments
Would require a constitutional amendment to do so. 2/3rds majority of the House and Senate and then ratification by 3/4ths of all state legislatures to outright remove it.
Or the interstate voting compact which just needs a couple more states. But that's a less direct mechanism that keeps the electoral college intact, just changes the way electoral votes are distributed.
There are still some other things that can be done federally to help. If they change the size of the house (determined by legislation not constitution), it also changes electoral votes for states. Electoral votes are based on house + senate seats per state
On its own that makes the electoral college much closer to representing the population of each state
I would also presume it likely would also make the popular vote compact way closer or cross the needed majority of electoral votes. Though I haven't done or seen any analysis on that directly so not 100% sure because the ways seats are appropriated can be funky and non-linear
I feel like it would be more realistic to repeal the Apportionment Act of 1911. At the very least, it would correct the massive inequality in congressional apportionment. It would also increase the number of electors in the largest states, which would mostly benefit democrats.
Yes and no.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact
The NPVIC may work to get around the electoral college without amending the constitution. It would still be FPTP which wouldn't be great. But it would at a minimum be an improvement, because it would do away with swing states, red voters stuck in blue states, and blue voters stuck in red states.
...and replace it with the election being won based primarily on turnout in California. Like seriously, the last few times a candidate won the electoral college but lost the popular vote it was a case where their margin in California was larger than their margin nationally. As in across the other 49 states more people voted for the person who won the electoral college, and California by itself was responsible for the swing to the other direction. Because California is just so ridiculously big compared to the other states.
No, it would replace it with a majority FPTP country wide system. Californians are a minority of the country. They do not get sole control, nor would they under a popular vote system.
But not all of that margin comes from California, and not all of Californians vote blue.
Where you live should have no effect on how much of a voice you have in the federal government. Everybody's vote should be counted, and counted equally, because we're all made equally. The current system completely fails at that.
Unless this also dramatically changes voting patterns nationwaide it's essentially the same thing. Every time in recent history the electoral college and popular vote have yielded different results, the difference was smaller than the margin in California.
That's arbitrary. The same is probably true of Florida/Texas combined.
The whole point is that the power of a vote is independent of location.
While dramatic things like making the senate votes proportional or abolishing the electoral college might require a constitutional amendment, the text is silent on plurality vs RCW or what have you.
Congress could mandate a switch with a simple law, and point to their power to ensure democracy, same as the post bush v gore laws that mandated electronic voting machines.
Of course, it's already got every state that benefits from it being passed, and a few more that signed on but only benefit so long as their preferences are always in line with California. Which collectively isn't enough for it to go active.
Now you've got to convince states that will both lose power and routinely get results out of line with their preferences to sign onto the thing that will do that.
...and once it goes active it will go to the courts where the argument will be whether as an interstate compact it has to be federally approved or if the state's right to assign their electors as they please trumps that.