California governor signs National Popular Vote legislation
The National Popular Vote campaign is a national effort being conducted to eliminate the Electoral College by convincing enough states to change the manner in which they award their electoral votes. States that adopt this legislation will award their electoral votes to the candidate which wins the national popular vote-even if that candidate does not win the popular vote within that particular state. Once enough states sign National Popular Vote legislation it will render the Electoral College irrelevant.
California Governor Jerry Brown signed legislation which brings the National Popular Vote supporters closer to their goal–California’s 55 electoral votes will now go to the winner of the national popular vote regardless of how California voters vote.
The National Popular Vote movement is now halfway toward their goal of changing the constitution without amending it. And this is where my problem with this effort lies.
My problem with the effort isn’t the attempt to change the mode of selecting the president–and in fact I believe that the individual states do have the right to award their electoral votes in this manner if they so choose–but rather the procedure which is being used to effect that change.
The problem is that these states are not working on this legislation alone in an attempt to do what is best for their state, this is part of a national effort to change the constitution without amending it. The NPV movement is colluding with the various states in order to produce the outcome they hope for–as is evidenced by the fact that none of the states which have enacted NPV legislation will see that legislation go into effect until there are enough states signed on to the legislation that ensure a majority of the Electoral College votes. These states don’t believe enough in the legislation to enact it on their own–if they truly believed in the movement why wouldn’t they simply change their mode of handing out electoral votes regardless of what the other states did or did not do?
The constitution set up the Electoral College as a means to best ensure a representative government and to avoid setting up a pure democracy; if there are enough people in the United States who feel the Electoral College is outdated and needs to be changed there is a process which was set up in the constitution to provide for just such an instant–it is called the amendment process.
But the amendment process can take years and the people behind the NPV movement do not want to wait so they are using this effort to work their way around the constitution and the procedures set up within it.
Regardless of whether you agree or disagree with the Electoral College that really isn’t the larger issue here; the larger issue is the system and the constitution for they are both under attack. You may feel that I am going overboard, but this is an obvious attempt at changing the constitution without using constitutional procedures, and while there probably is nothing that can be done about this in the courts, it does set a dangerous precedent moving forward.
The framers of the constitution intentionally made the amendment process slow and difficult because they knew changing the founding document should be well considered and not done on a whim; yet the NPV movement has found a way to circumvent the constitution and if they are successful here who knows what a group may go after in the constitution next using this nefarious plan.
There is nothing more important than ensuring the integrity and the credibility of our system of governance, and if a group is so easily able to subvert the system in this case it does not bode well for the future integrity of the constitution.
America's Watchtower 
This doesn’t change the Constitution – the Constitution never calls for states to award all their electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote within their borders. The Constitution leaves it to the states to decide how to allocate electoral votes.
Remember the Framers made a few mistakes when it came to deciding how to elect the President and Vice President – check Amendment #12.
No amendment is needed here, though – and only eleven states are necessary to guarantee that the winner of the popular vote receives the electoral vote.
Take good care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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As I stated in the article I feel the states do hve the right to pass this type of legislation; the constitution gives the states the right to decide the manner in which they award their electoral votes. But these states arent doing this individually and that is where my problem is. If California wants to give out their votes based on the national popular vote than so be it; pass the law and move on, but these states are passing this legislation with the contingency that it will not go into effect until enough states have passed the legislation. This isn’t a case of states woking on thei on behalf, it is a national movement.
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The tyranny of democracy cometh!
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The United States was almost completely changed from a republic to a democracy when the people were given the choice to elect senators instead of the states, this will complete the tranformation.
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I wonder if the folks in Califailure have figured out that their vote will be rendered irrelevant by this?
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Mattt, have you considered that the way most states allocate their electoral college votes, many of their citizens’ votes don’t count anyway? I live in Georgia, and my vote for President doesn’t count.
To be fair, my GOP friends in New York know that their votes don’t count either.
Californians of both major parties now know that their individual votes will matter more than they have to date. Which is a good thing, wouldn’t you say?
Take good care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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Just because you are on the losing side of a vote, it doesn’t mean your vote doesn’t count. In New Hampshire in 2010 Obama won the state, but I still voted; my vote was counted and I lost. That is the way it works, we can’t all be winners every time. How is that wrong?
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The National Popular Vote program isn’t designed to make everyone a winner; that’s not possible. There will still be a single winner of the Presidency and many losers. The difference will be that the winner will be the person for whom the most Americans voted, regardless of their state of residence.
I cannot believe you guys are so intent on maintaining a system that in 2012 will put the ultimate decision in the hands of just a few states, and just a handful of voters in those states.
Actually, I can believe it, because I think you’re honestly committed to a system where a small group can dictate to the majority.
Take good care, and may God bless us all!
TGY
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Accoding to the article the California legislators claim this will make the state more relevant.
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Exactly… Rendered irrelevant, and they traipse off to Starbucks and the Mall and buy a new purse or something…
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LOL – you guys are scared! It’s becoming more and more clear as you try the typical connie tactic of sneering mockery. You’d rather sacrifice California’s 55 EC votes to the Dems and throw their 4.5 million GOP voters under the bus because you don’t believe in government of the people, you believe in government by elitist minorities!
You know the T-Party influence will be greatly diminished by the National Popular Vote program even as it includes the votes of all American voters in its determination of allocating EC ballots.
This program will make every American’s vote count – no wonder you guys are running scared!
Take food care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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You have to understand that in the case of California, it will be Democrat every single time. this would be the one and only way a Republican could get their hands on those 55 electoral votes. Of course, if out of control immigration continues as it is, this whole discussion is moot.
I thought you were on vacation?
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That is an interesting point, under this system there is the chance Calfornia could go Republican even though the vast majority of the state is Democrat. It seems backwards to me that a state wold change the will of the voters.
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I am on vacation, coming home tonight, but I wasw sitting on the beach with the laptop and saw this story so I threw something together quickly. I couldn’t help myself.
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I wonder how come I haven’t heard anyone whimpering about Maine and Nebraska violating the Constitution in the way they allocate their EC votes?
You could look it up . . .
Take good care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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Nebraska and Maine allocate their electoral votes proportionally, after a fashion. If the states are allowed to decide how their electoral votes will be awarded, how is that violating the Constitution?
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It’s not – and that’s just my point. If a state decides to allocate its EC votes to the winner of the national popular vote, how is that violating the Constitution?
Yet we’re hearing things like “this will undermine our entire system.” How? By making my vote matter even though I live in a red state? Or by making the millions of GOP votes in New York and California matter?
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Don’t need to look it up, and as I said in the post and in my first reply to you the states have the right to award their votes any way they see fit. California is not doing anything wrong technically, but my problem is with the national movement and the contingency place on this legislation becoming law. This is not simply a state changing their method for handing out their votes, it is an effort being carried out nationally in an effort to change the national system.
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Steve, a great deal of state-level legislation is enacted as the result of national movements, from national cottage cheese day to model electrical and building codes. There’s no requirement that states act in a vacuum, or re-invent the wheel, when enacting any legislation. I don’t understand why you seem to think that for legislation in a state to have real legitimacy, it must originate within that state’s legislature and not be connected to the efforts of any other. As to the contingency of popular-vote legislation taking effect only upon the passage of similar legislation in other states, we also have many such arrangements nationwide – multi-state compacts whose operations are contingent upon the ratification by multiple state legislatures. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is one such compact.
The manner of allocating EC ballots didn’t start out as “winner-take-all.” Only two states, in fact, allocated their EC ballots that way in the beginning; most states’ legislatures chose the electors and some provided for Electors’ selection on a district-by-district basis. The current winner-take-all approach didn’t gain wide popularity until about forty years after the Constitution’s passage – hardly evidence of it being the system the founders intended. In fact, it can easily be argued that states shifted to the winner-take-all approach primarily out of self-interest, not national interest.
Remember that the EC itself is a compromise. What most people conveniently fail to note is that it’s a compromise in two areas. The first of these, the big state – small state issue, isn’t of nearly the consequence it was over two centuries ago. The second, though, is worth considering, because its basis is disenfranchisement – a state’s EC strength is proportional to its population, not its voters. Without the EC, no constitutional amendment would have been necessary to give women the right to vote because any state that did so would have doubled its voting strength overnight. The existence of the EC, though meant that the population of women was counted even while their voices were unheard.
Again, I think that the major source of opposition to the National Popular Vote movement is that it will diminish the power of radical and fringe groups to manipulate electoral outcomes, especially in the handful of states judged to be “battleground states” in presidential elections. By giving weight to my vote in Georgia and Sean Hannity’s in New York, no state’s EC votes can be taken for granted, which is better for our country.
Take good care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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I guess I don’t understand how this will make anyone’s vote more relevant. If I vote for Mitt Romney in November of 2012 and the national popular vote goes to Barack Obama and New Hampshire adopted this legislation and awarded the EC votes to Obama, how is my voice heard any louder than it was in 2010? Now if you compound this with this scenario: Mitt Romney wins the popular vote in New Hampshire while Obama wins the national popular vote and the NHEC hands the EC votes to Obama it seems even more dubious for the majority of the states voters will have had their votes ignored.
I actually like the idea of handing out EC votes on a proportional basis, I think that is the fairest way to do it.
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Steve, let’s say that Mr. Romney wins the popular vote on a national basis, but loses in the EC. Your vote becomes more relevant because it doesn’t stop at the NH border – it’s combined with the votes of Americans nationwide to trigger EC votes for Romney by the states which voted for the Popular Vote plan – thus putting Mitt Romney into the White House even if he loses the popular vote in New Hampshire.
Just as when you vote for Governor – your choice might not win the vote in your electoral district, but your vote is combined with the votes of all other good New Hampshireans, like my good friend Tom in Merrimac, it may be that even though choice didn’t win in your town, he or she will win the majority of votes state-wide, because the power of your vote doesn’t stop at the city limits.
Take good care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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But then you have some pretty ticked off Democrats in New Hampshire who feel their vote didn’t count. It really is a vicious circle and an interesting debate.
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This is nothing but a progressive scheme being carried out by the progressive states network to take away the ability for smaller states to have a voice. I and RHM have researched and written a number of articles on this. We have been attacked by progressive trolls (toto) who support this terrible idea that threaten to undermine the entire system. I’ll stick with how the founders set it up. http://www.sentryjournal.com/2010/09/24/popular-vote-by-the-numbers/.
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Thanks for the link John, I will be checking it out.
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Thanks for the link. Very good description of how it works. That would be the whole point. Just make the country one big blue state right?
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The founders did not set up a system where “winner takes all” – or are Nebraska and Maine violating the Constitution?
If you look forward to 2012, you’ll see that only a handful of states are considered “battleground” states – that is, states with no clear GOP or Dem majority, states that both sides think they have a chance of winning. It’s those states – large and small – whose needs will be addressed and whose issues will be dealt with in 2012, by both sides. I live in Georgia – since this is a “red” state, and solidly so, there’ll be no serious effort on the part of either Presidential candidate to win my vote, and national policy considertions will not be made with the objective of appealing to Georgia’s voters.
And national policy objectives, as far as any of us can tell, certainly are made based on potential electoral ooutcomes. Part of that is the way it’s supposed to be, but I think we all agree that if Iowa weren’t the first state to make a decision in primary decision, the corn subsidy and ethanol programs — programs many consider to be unnecessary — wouldn’t be costing our Treasury so much.
The National Popular Vote program isn’t at all incinsistent with the Constitution. It may be inconsistent with a tradition of “winner takes all” elecotral vote allocation, which effectively disenfranchises the millions of minority party voters in most states and gives outsize influence to just a handful of states every election cycle,
One thing it does is diminish the importance of the election experts, gurus and pundits who’ve learned the game of electoral college politics very well. It also – and this might be why conservatives are so upset with it – encourage more centrist positions by candidates because radical fringes won’t have the ability to throw an election one way or another. In a state evenly divided, 49% Dem and 49% GOP, it’s the 2% who will make the difference in the current system followed by 48 states. The National Popular Vote program deprives that 2% of the ability to control American politics – and that’s why, IMO, the radical rightwing is so strongly opposed to is.
Finally, note that I managed to get through the entire (rather long) post without a single ad hominem reference. No name-calling – that’s one of the things I enjoy about Steve’s style, it marks him as someone bright enough to know that even if he does win an argument by name-calling, the victory won’tt last.because it’s based onsomething other than facts and logic.
Take good care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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TGY,
I have read all of your responses to this article and I do understand what you are saying. You make a solid case as to why the states are constitutionally permitted to enact such laws and why the entire process has a variety of problems. For years many people have questioned the wisdom of having an Electoral College process in our system. I at one time questioned the wisdom of it until I did my research and learned what the intent of the founders was on this issue. Why were they so fearful of what NPV is advancing in regards to a winner take-all based on the national popular vote?
Before I answer we must view the Electoral College process as only one part of the totality of federalism. The founders were fearful of power concentrated in one central location, whether it was at the federal, state, or the people. They wanted to create a series of checks and balances to ensure that this would never happen. The system of government they crafted was designed to spread the power around and be shared by what many of them believed to be competing forces. They did this by creating a republican form of government or a representative democracy to ensure that none of the competing forces would ever have the ability to impose their will without the consent of the others. The people elected representatives to the House, the states appointed Senators (The progressives already tinkered with this via the 17th amendment to make it a popular vote), and the Electoral College selected the President and VP of the United States. This spreading around of power was designed to keep the governments close to the people and its authority shared by not consolidating power under one roof. This shared power to govern is called federalism and the Electoral College is a key component of it.
The founders also feared that by allowing the President and VP to be elected by popular vote, states with larger populations would have a bigger voice at the table than less populated states like mine. Think about all the problems this would create. I’ll give you an example. Let’s say my state is a leading agricultural state in wheat production and California decides it wants to become the number wheat producer and control the price of it. So the representatives and senators from California propose some new environmental bill that forces wheat farmers nationwide to modify all their tractors so that they meet some rigid environmental standard. The expense is high for these modifications and now North Dakota finds itself unable produce as much wheat in a cost effective manner and they lose market share. Which state will the senators and representatives have a bigger voice on this matter in regards to executive branch if our Presidential elections are based on the popular vote? It won’t be North Dakota because their population is only a fraction of California’s.
This is the whole point of the Electoral College; under it North Dakota and smaller populated states like it have as much say at the table as a heavily populated state. You are equally represented in voice because you count. The problem I see with these state legislators and governors, especially from smaller states is they don’t even realize they’re cutting their own throats when they pass and sign into law this NPV pushed popular vote winner take all agenda because they don’t have the background as to what it’s all about. All they see is that the will of the people should be heard. Sometimes the will of the people get it wrong. In this case the will of the people becomes less relevant under a popular vote method because they are trading a representative democracy for a direct/pure democracy where mob rule is the game in town. This is exactly the kind of thing our founders feared. This is the kind of thing that will break up a country because eventually 49% of the people are going to get tired of being told what to do by the other 51%.
Yes TGY the states have the right to do this, but it doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do. Yes we do have problems; however most of these problems have been caused by a two party system. Party loyalty over using sound judgment has become the flavor of the century. Maybe we should look at eliminating the parties instead of modifying the constitution or the Electoral process. In the end our founders were pretty smart guys and I tend to go with what they said on the issue rather than what the modern day politician or organization has to say.
The reason I say this is because the founders were looked into the face of tyranny and knew first-hand how precious liberty was. I’m not so sure the folks we have elected understand the same.
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Thanks for the compliment TGY!
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As always, Steve, happy to tell the truth. There’s a minimum of name-calling here, and those that like to engage in it seem to get tired and go elsewhere because not too many of us rise to the bait. You run a nice site here where honest Americans can share their opinions and disagree without being disagreeable.
And may God continue to bless us all!
TGY
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Great answer John! i wish i could have stated it so well in the first place! You are right about the founders; they purposely set up a republic because they feared democracy almost as much as the feared monarchy. They saw democracy as a tyranny of the majority over the minority and took the steps to ensure that didn’t happen.
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Just another attempt to get socialists elected in perpetuity. I wish more people would ask questions about the Supreme Court ruling in 2010 — I thought it was just someone trying to tweak me at first. Sadly it was true.
Below is a short description read the rest at –
http://skinnyreporter.com/cumulativevoting.html
WASHINGTON, D.C., Oct. 25, 2010 — The U.S. Supreme Court today affirmed a lower court ruling that granted extra ballots to minority voters in New York State and then expanded the ruling to include all elections.
In a 5-4 decision the high court agreed with the lobbying group Legalization of Latinos (LOL) and the Obama Administration that Hispanic voters deserve six votes each, while white voters are permitted just one. The justices also granted extra votes to other minorities, including African Americans (eight votes per person), native Americans (seven votes), Muslims (six), atheists (five), Wiccans and transexuals (four), Pacific Islanders (three), and Jews and Asians (two each).
Pay particular attention to Kagan’s remarks.
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The linked article is satire – you knew that, right?
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I am more worried about what they did with this little number: As I read it, if the two top vote getters are Dems, that is what you will have in the General election.
Starting in 2011, voters will be able to choose any candidate – regardless of the voter’s party or the candidate’s. The top two vote-getters would then go on to the general election.
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Actually, for those who feel the need to kneel and genuflect whenever the Constitution as originally written is mentioned, that’s exactly the way our system was set up. There were no parties and no primaries. The general election involved people voting for electors. “Vote for ME for E;ector, and I’ll cast my vote for a good conservative!”
This very quickly became “Vote for ME for Elector and I’ll cast my ballot for John Adams!”
Whoever received the mostt electoral votes became President, whoever got the next most became Vice President. If we’d held our most recent election according to those rules, Barack Obama would be President, and John McCain would be Vice President.
Fortunately for the aspirations of Sarah Palin and Dan Quayle, among others, the founders quickly realized their mistake and passed the 12th Amendment lickety-split.
Take good care, and may God bless us all!
TGY
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After they ram this through the next Dem president opens the borders, great
The Founding Fathers had that in there for a reason… but the progs and them never do see quite eye to eye, do they
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Where in the Constitution does it mandate that a state’s entire Electoral College vote must be allocated on a winner-take-all basis?
If more states had taken Maine’s or Nebraska’s approach, this movement would likely never have gained any traction.
Don’t think for a moment that the founders intended that presidential elections be determined by only a handful of voters in a small percentage of states, which is the system we have in place now.
California’s action means that the votes off the state’s millions of Republicans will have a real impact on the Presidential election in 2012 – I’m surprised that’s not important to people. It seems that the only thing that matters is the ability to canipulate the outcome in the handful of battleground states, taking the electoral outcomes in the majority of states for granted.
Take good care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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Huh. Tricky, tricky. But given the fact that CA usually votes blue, won’t this potentially help the GOP if the national popular vote goes the way I hope it will?
enjoy the rest of your vay cay!
Lin
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That is the ironic part of this whole story; more than likely California is going to vote blue so the only time this legislation would rear its ugly head would be when a Republican won the national popular vote. It would be fun to watch the reaction of the voters of California if that ever were to be the case.
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Steve, it’d be like the game of musical chairs Massachusetts played during the last few years of Senator Kennedy’s life – the Dem legislature couldn’t stand the idea that (GOP) Gov Romney would appoint a Republican to represent Massachusetts in the Senate, and so provided for a special election instead, but then a Dem became Governor, but Teddy died before they changed the law back, and Masachusetts, via the special election, sent a Republican to the Senate!
Take good care and may God bless us all!
TGY
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Actually the legislature did change the law back in time; Deval Patrick was allowed to appoint a replacement until a special election was able to be held. I can’t think of his name off the top of my head, I apologize, but it was thought at the time that they could push the special election out far enough so that it wouldn’t impact the Obamacare vote. So Patrick appointed a man whom he knew would give Obama a “yes” vote on healthcare, but the vote was delayed until after the special election and we all know how that turned out.
This is a perfect example of what can happen when there is basically one party rule.
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