RECLAIMING AMERICA: THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE

RECLAIMING DEMOCRACY:  THE LONG WAY HOME. 

BURY THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE

By Jack Random

How the Electoral College could have survived for as long as it has is beyond the comprehension of any reasonable person.  All defenses rest upon the fundamental belief that the people cannot be trusted to choose their own leaders.  You can believe in aristocracy and support the Electoral College.  You can believe in monarchy or autocracy or outright dictatorship and support this antiquated system.  But you cannot believe in the republic – a representative form of democracy – and still support the Electoral College. 

The same people who defend the filibuster as a means to protect the rights of the minority invariably argue that the Electoral College is essential to protect the interests of the smaller states.  Don’t be fooled for a fraction of a microsecond.  The defenders of the Electoral College have no more interest in the people of West Virginia than they do the people of Massachusetts.  They only want to game the system and impose the power of the elite over the will of the people. 

The defenders of the rich and privileged class tell us that without the Electoral College presidential candidates would ignore the so-called “flyover” states but they are entirely unmoved by the fact that every four years for as long as I can remember presidential candidates have ignored the forty million voters of my home state in California and the twenty million voters of New York in the general election.  California and New York have been ignored in the primary season as well – although a change in the primary schedule may end that in the current campaign at least for California.  Apparently it is fine that our votes and interests are dismissed as irrelevant as long as Ohio and New Hampshire have their say. 

It is also the case that because of the Electoral College system the entire South with the exception of Florida is ignored in the general election.  Only the Republicans set foot in Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, Texas or Louisiana during the primaries.  Once the general election begins the South ceases to exist. 

While it is true that larger states that are not considered battlegrounds might get more attention with a popular vote for president, it is not true that the smaller states would be ignored.  In a free and fair election between qualified nominees, candidates will search everywhere to boost their vote totals.  For the first time since the Civil Rights movement, Democrats will venture below the Mason-Dixon line.  For the first time since Reagan, both Republicans and Democrats will visit California for more than corporate fundraisers. 

Has it occurred to Democrats that the reason the South consistently and overwhelmingly votes Republican is that Democrats don’t seem to care?  They don’t show up.  They don’t campaign.  They let the local candidates take care of themselves.  If you never hear progressive opinions, how likely are you to vote for progressive candidates? 

The South is changing both demographically and politically.  It’s changing faster than anyone from outside the region imagines.  Just as Californians are tired of their votes having no impact on presidential races, Southerners must feel the same way.  Both are neglected because of the winner-take-all Electoral College system.  Why vote when the outcome has already been etched in bronze? 

On the same line, has it occurred to Republicans that they need to show up in Democratic states?  There are conservatives in California, Washington, Massachusetts and New York.  Republicans have won elections in the blue states in the past but no one will vote for candidates that don’t bother to show up and state their case. 

I have never heard a citizen of Montana proclaim that his or her vote should count fifty or sixty times more than a Californian’s vote but that is exactly what the Electoral College system does.  It magnifies the votes of small states while shrinking the importance of large state votes to the extent that a post-Reagan California voter can rightfully state that his or her vote has never counted in a presidential election. 

In fact, in the last election as well as the next, if you do not live in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin or Florida, your vote was little more than an intellectual exercise in civic duty.  Oh, it may have counted for state and local elections but it did not and will not count for the presidency. [1]

The Electoral College was created at a time when voting in a national election was a cumbersome and time-consuming process.  Its primary purpose was to act as a shield against the common, uneducated masses.  If the people made a terrible mistake by voting for an English or French monarch’s proxy, for example, an assembly of electors could correct the error.  The founders never anticipated that their twisted system would enable a proxy of the Russian government to become the leader of the free world. 

Like our current president, the founders were not entirely persuaded that representative democracy was a viable system.  They were uncertain their experiment would survive the ages.  They were obsessed with erecting barriers to the naked will of the uneducated mob.  Remember that ordinary working people were not allowed to vote in the early years of the republic.  Let alone women and people of color, only the landed gentry were allowed to participate in choosing a president.  Recall that slaves were accounted for as 3/5ths of a vote belonging to their masters. 

After two and a half centuries it is past time to commit to democracy.  A representative democracy with an educated populace is a viable system of government.  It is superior to every other type of government and it is time that we acknowledge its viability.  It is time for those aristocratic defenders of the Electoral College to step aside and allow us to begin the work of rebuilding our democratic institutions.  It is time to abolish the Electoral College by any means.  Never again should a minority of voters elect a president of the United States of America. 

There are at least two ways to end the Electoral College.  One is to pass a constitutional amendment replacing the twelfth amendment with a simple majority vote of the electorate.  The second is a process currently under way.  It is called the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact and it involves gathering the support of enough states to capture 270 electoral votes – the number needed to elect a president. [2]

At present it has been enacted in fifteen states and the District of Columbia representing 196 electoral votes.  The campaign should go on.  At present mostly Democratic leaning states predominantly from the east and west have joined the compact.  The case has not been made effectively enough in the South or the Midwest.  I believe the people of Missouri and Kansas, Nevada and Georgia can be persuaded that a direct election of the president and vice president is in all of our interests.  It will force politicians and presidents to consider the needs of all Americans.  It will end the era of battleground states where presidential candidates spend all their time in the handful of states that will decide the winner of the Electoral College. 

Moreover, it is the right thing to do.  If you believe in democracy, it is absolutely the right thing to do. 

Success of the National Popular Vote compact would be a great step forward.  It would stop the Electoral College in its tracks.  However, it would not bury it.  It would leave the future of American democracy on weak grounds.  The defenders of the Electoral College would campaign hard, spending unlimited amounts of corporate money, to overturn the compact in the critical states.  To kill and bury the college for good we will need a constitutional amendment. 

Amending the constitution is a long and arduous process.  It must be passed by a two-thirds vote in both the Senate and the House.  The proposed amendment must then be ratified by three-fourths of the states.  The process is extremely difficult for a reason.  The constitution should not be altered on a whim or subjected to the passions of the day.  An amendment to the constitution must be simple and fundamental to the American system of government.  Amendments for the right to vote and a direct election of the president are exactly that:  Straightforward and fundamental. 

To paraphrase Tom Paine:  Democracy comes at a high price.  “What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly.” [3]

Our politicians have become accustomed to gaming the system.  Every four years they play variations on the same game.  Every four years candidates concoct bizarre formulas for securing a winning total of electors.  Every four years candidates pledge allegiance to farm subsidies and bio-fuels because Iowa and Ohio come early in the primary season.  When is the last time the candidates came through on their promises to the “flyover” states?   How often do presidents come to Ohio or New Hampshire when the campaign is over? 

We need a contingent of powerful advocates, including presidential candidates, who are fully committed to democracy and able to present the case for abolishing the Electoral College.  When that happens the college will finally fall and the entire nation will celebrate a rebirth of American democracy. 

Jazz. 

1.  “The 2020 Electoral Map Could Be the Smallest in Years.”  By Dan Balz.  Washington Post, August 31, 2019. 

2.  National Popular Vote Interstate Compact – Making Every Vote Count. 

3.  The American Crisis, Number 1.  By Thomas Paine. 

Jack Random is a novelist and political commentator.  His works include Wasichu: The Killing Spirit, Pawns to Players: The Chess Series, and the Jazzman Chronicles.