trackback >>The Moral Liberal: Defending the Judeo-Christian ethic, limited government, and the American constitution>>…

trackback >>The Moral Liberal: Defending the Judeo-Christian ethic, limited government, and the American constitution>>…

If the states who have (apparently) illegally entered into this interestate compact believe that this is a more appropriate way of conducting the vote, they should pursue an Amendment to the Constitution. We all know why they haven't done this….because they know it will not pass. This is simply yet another attempt at circumventing and undermining the Constitution.

I do have high esteem for the system, as designed, because the Constitution established a union of States…not a nation of individuals, as comprising one nation. The electoral system is a component of our federal system of government. Because there are 51 separate democratic elections in each State and the District of Columbia the system provides certain safe guards. If the national popular vote is inserted into the system it will nullify the safe guards and unleash forces the system was designed to prevent or restrain.

If the national popular vote determines the electoral vote of each State then one candidate will promise the people a piece of cake and the other candidate will counter with the promise to add a scoop of ice creme. You can see where this will end up.

However, I have had an awakening of sorts, and now I am making sense of all of the ways that our current form of government has deviated from the course set by the Founders. The electoral college was one of points of clarification that I needed, so I thank you for your excellent article.

Your article, and your post seem to contradict themselves, if you don't mind me saying. The article seems to have a very high esteem for the electoral voting process, while your response to me in the comments seems to indicate that the process is thoroughly broken (like most of our government).

Can you clarify where I'm confused, as well as expound on where in history the process went bad?

Now political parties chose the candidates and the electors pledged to vote for them before the electors meet to cast their vote. The independent electors, as I mentioned, have been replaced by party hacks who put the party and the acquisition of political power before the country. Thus, it is very rare to see an elector vote for anyone other than their party's candidate.

Political parties have perverted and seized control of the process. They hate the concept of independent electors like the ones I mentioned. So we are guaranteed the choice of death by poison or death by firing squad every 4 years.

If you think it's the lesser of two evils now, just wait and see what happens if the national popular vote is infused into the system.

Now 2/3rds of the states and voters are ignored — 19 of the 22 smallest and medium-small states and big states like California, Georgia, New York, and Texas. The current winner-take-all rule (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in each state) used by 48 of the 50 states, and not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Constitution, ensures that the candidates do not reach out to all of the states and their voters. Candidates have no reason to poll, visit, advertise, organize, campaign, or care about the voter concerns in the dozens of states where they are safely ahead or hopelessly behind. Policies important to the citizens of ‘flyover’ states are not as highly prioritized as policies important to ‘battleground’ states when it comes to governing.

In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). Support for a national popular vote is strong in virtually every state, partisan, and demographic group surveyed in recent polls in closely divided battleground states: Colorado– 68%, Iowa –75%, Michigan– 73%, Missouri– 70%, New Hampshire– 69%, Nevada– 72%, New Mexico– 76%, North Carolina– 74%, Ohio– 70%, Pennsylvania — 78%, Virginia — 74%, and Wisconsin — 71%; in smaller states (3 to 5 electoral votes): Alaska — 70%, DC — 76%, Delaware –75%, Maine — 77%, Nebraska — 74%, New Hampshire –69%, Nevada — 72%, New Mexico — 76%, Rhode Island — 74%, and Vermont — 75%; in Southern and border states: Arkansas –80%, Kentucky — 80%, Mississippi –77%, Missouri — 70%, North Carolina — 74%, and Virginia — 74%; and in other states polled: California — 70%, Connecticut — 74% , Massachusetts — 73%, Minnesota — 75%, New York — 79%, Washington — 77%, and West Virginia- 81%.

Most voters don't care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state . . . they care whether he/she wins the White House. Voters want to know, that even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was counted and mattered to their candidate.
http://www.NationalPopularVote.com

If a Democratic presidential candidate receives the most votes, the state's dedicated Democratic party activists who have been chosen as its slate of electors become the Electoral College voting block. If a Republican presidential candidate receives the most votes, the state's dedicated Republican party activists who have been chosen as its slate of electors become the Electoral College voting block. The winner of the presidential election is the candidate who collects 270 votes from Electoral College voters from among the winning party's dedicated activists.

Besides the helpful warning about the popular vote project, this article makes the very important point that the US Constitution was clearly drafted with the idea that the states were in control and the central government was created as a compact of the states and is thus subservient to the states. Since the states are created by the people, this points out yet again the correct pecking order for our system:
1) People create
2) State governments which create
3) Federal government.
If this were understood and followed today, the state government rather than the federal would be the more powerful governmental force and he would have greater control over his life. Sadly, today, it's the other way.
FWIW, I'd like to see the 17th amendment repealed and it seems clear the US Constitution contemplates the states can set up their presidential elector system however they want, possibly subject to the 14th amendment and, of course, subject to the state's constitution.
Many people don't want to admit it because it doesn't sound PC today but, the truth is that the Founding Fathers intentionally avoided creating a democracy because they feared, correctly in my opinion, government by the masses. (The comedian Jay Leno has proven the wisdom of the Founders' concern in his 'Jay Walking' segment.) Sadly, the means the Founders used to separate the "wheat from the chaff" were not enlightened by today's standards.

I can't help but ask, "Then why have we always had such loathsome candidates coming from both parties?" "Why are we always faced with the choice of voting for 'the lesser of two evils'?"

We need a follow up to this article that addresses that issue in some detail, and fills in that crucial gap.