This is the continuation of my previous post on the
Electoral College. Here, I consider the
impact the Electoral College has on modern presidential campaigns, as
contrasted with a system direct popular election that was called for in the
Bayh-Celler Amendment. You might want to
go back and read the previous post first.
The Electoral College
Today
Were some extra-terrestrial political scientist to land in
the United States sometime over the next two weeks, and were he, she or it to observe
the campaign currently underway, our visitor might report back to the planet
Wmzypholg that Mr. Obama and Mr. Romney were in a close contest for the
presidency of Ohio. Both candidates are
so shameless in flaunting their love for Ohio that one wonders why they ever
leave that state. Ohioans might be
wondering if they ever will. Talking
heads on television can’t seem to repeat often enough, “No Republican has ever
won the presidency without the support of Ohio.” We are treated to the spectacle of a
Republican governor seeking re-election by boasting about the low unemployment
level in Ohio, while the Republican candidate for President talks incessantly about
high unemployment in Ohio. Democrats
plan to keep Ohio in their column by touting the number of Ohio jobs saved by
the federal bailout of the auto industry, which is centered in Michigan. I mean no slight to Buckeyes, but might we ask
just what makes them so important as to serve as virtual proxies for the rest
of the nation in a presidential election?
It also has not escaped our notice that presidential
candidates seldom come to Vermont. True,
Mitt Romney holed up in West Windsor for a week to prepare for the first
debate, but we never saw him. Barack
Obama did visit Burlington for a fund raiser last spring, but for all the
attention we have received since our space visitor could be forgiven for concluding
that we had joined Canada. We feel a bit
ignored, neglected or maybe just taken for granted. We are not alone. In fact, the majority of states receive scant
attention by presidential candidates and for good strategic reasons, given the
realities of the Electoral College.
We saw in the previous post that presidents are elected on a
state by state basis, usually with the winner of each state taking all of that state’s
electoral votes, no matter how small the margin of victory. It is conceivable, but unlikely, that a
candidate could win with only narrow victories in 11 states: California, Texas,
New York, Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Georgia, North
Carolina, New Jersey—270 votes among them.
Combine that with the fact that most states are dominated by one or the
other of the two national parties and one can begin to understand how the
Electoral College shapes—in the view of some, distorts—the presidential
campaign. With three electoral votes to
offer, and a reliable record of supporting Democrats in recent years, Vermont
is just not a high priority for either candidate. To the Obama Campaign, we are already in the
bag. To the Romney Campaign, we are a
hopeless cause. Neither has an incentive
to expend time or resources here for all of three electoral votes and neither candidate is likely to drop by
just to admire the fall foliage.
The picture is not all that different for large states that
reliably support a single party. The
Obama campaign knows it can assume that California, Massachusetts and New York
will deliver their combined 98 electoral votes for Mr. Obama. No need to expend much effort in any of those
states. The Romney campaign knows it has
Texas, Georgia and Indiana, giving them 74 votes that are virtually
uncontested. In fact, it appears that President
Obama currently has a safe 259 electoral votes, while Governor Romney trails
with only 199 safe electoral votes. So
458 electoral votes are practically uncontested and the race is on for the
remaining 80 votes. Many of these come
from states that “lean” one way or the other, meaning they are more likely than
not to support a single party, but their outcome is not so assured. Candidate may spend time there and the
campaigns will certainly be planning active “get out the vote” measures for
Election Day. But the real contest is
now focusing on the few remaining swing states
Now let’s return to Ohio: 20 electoral votes and perhaps the
swingiest of the swing states, no wonder it is getting all the love. Ohio is joined by several other swing states
that will actually determine who will occupy the residence at 1600 Pennsylvania
Avenue in Washington for the next four years.
Florida and Pennsylvania are typically in play. This year they are joined by Virginia and
Wisconsin, and maybe New Hampshire, Nevada, Colorado and Iowa. In most of these the swing seems to favor
President Obama, giving him perhaps 277 electoral votes, enough to win. But that could still change. Watch Ohio, Wisconsin and Iowa closely. You can bet the family farm the campaigns
are.
As things stand now, a Republican voter in Vermont or a
Democratic voter in Texas might as well stay home, unless there are down-ticket
contests that motivate them. Their votes
are not really nullified by the Electoral College. Since their presence in the state is counted
for purposes of Electoral College apportionment (remember, same as the
congressional delegation) their votes are effectively transferred to the other
party, whether they actually cast a ballot or not. Although
it is hard to prove, critics suggest this might depress voter turnout in all
but the swing states. If the campaigns
are not focused on the safe states, maybe their local issues will not be addressed. Campaigns and supporting groups are less
likely to spend for advertising (perhaps a blessing) in states where the end
result is all but determined. Parties
are less inclined to work to get out the vote.
As happened in 1876, 1888 and 2000, the winner of the popular vote still
might not win 270 electoral votes, violating the one-person-one-vote rule of
modern democratic politics.
Were a system of direct popular election used, every vote in
every state would count equally. Even
voters who support a minority party in their state, Democrats in Mississippi or
Republicans in Massachusetts, would have an incentive to vote, knowing they are
contributing to a national vote tally.
Parties would have an incentive to register voters in every state and
campaigns would have to address potential voters in every state. Maybe candidates would even come to
Vermont. It is lovely this time of the
year! Of course, everything has its
downside. People who live in states
currently taken for granted would find their television stations beaming a lot
more campaign commercials their way and they would be annoyed by considerably more
robocalls. No one ever said democracy was
easy.
The apportionment of electoral votes introduces another
distortion. The influence of small
states, Vermont included, is overstated relative to their population, thus
explaining the filibuster of the Bayh-Celler Amendment by senators from smaller states. In regional terms this results
in an over-representation of southern and plains states, and while Democrats do
nicely in several smaller states, again including Vermont, this regional
distortion tends to favor Republicans over Democrats. This makes alleged voter suppression attempts
by Republican-dominated legislatures in several key states, Ohio. Pennsylvania,
Florida, an even more critical issue. If
only a small portion of a demographic group that tends to vote heavily
Democratic, African-Americans, the young, certain Latino groups, is discouraged
from casting a ballot, it could swing a large number of electoral votes and
potentially an entire election, even if the impact on the total popular vote is
small. Arguably, the Electoral College
encourages the suppression of minority votes.
One final problem we might touch upon, if only because it is
one frequently discussed in the media whenever the subject of the Electoral
College does come up—the “faithless elector” who does not vote for the
candidate of their party. The problem is
real, one estimate claiming a total of 158 such renegade electoral votes over
the years. Nearly half of these occurred
because of vice presidential candidates dying before the electoral votes were
to be cast, a possibility cited by some in defense of keeping the Electoral
College intact. About 85 electors have
changed their votes because of personal ideology or loyalty to another
candidate. However, faithless electors are few and usually act alone. To date, no presidential election has ever
been thrown by faithless electors. The
closest exception was vice presidential candidate Richard Mentor Johnson, who
failed to win a majority in the Electoral College in 1836 when 23 electors from
Virginia refused to support his candidacy because he had previously lived with
an African-American woman who had born him several children. The election was thrown to the Senate, where
Johnson was easily chosen. Today, 24
states have laws punishing faithless electors, the rest relying on party
loyalty and peer-pressure to ensure that electors deliver their votes according
to popular preference. It is safe to say
that were a faithless elector ever to throw an election to the other party,
that person should not plan on ever having a political career. The problem is thus overstated.
It would be possible for electors to create a 269-269
tie. That would throw the selection of
the president into the House of Representatives, where Governor Romney would
probably win the state by state vote, regardless of the balance in the popular
vote. There are more states with
Republican-dominated House delegations, a reality that could survive even if
the Democrats win a majority of House seats in the next Congress. On the other hand, selection of a Vice
President would devolve to the Senate, where Vice President Joe Biden would
probably come out on top. For the first
time since the first Adams Administration, we would have a president and a vice
president from rival parties!
That would probably also be the last we would hear from the
planet Wmzypholg.
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