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Sacbee 12-4-2007      Electoral bid's time crunch

GOP-backed intiative may miss June vote, aim instead for November.

By Kevin Yamamura - kyamamura@sacbee.com
Published 12:00 am PSTTuesday, December 4, 2007

Elections officials on Monday said backers of an initiative to change how California's

electoral votes are counted are at risk of missing the June ballot because it will be

difficult to finish counting signatures by a state deadline next month.

The initiative has drawn national attention because it would assign California's electors

on a district-by-district basis rather than award the statewide winner all 55 electoral

votes, potentially dividing up a state that has been reliably Democratic since 1992.

Proponents have yet to submit signatures to counties despite a recommendation

from Secretary of State Debra Bowen that they do so three weeks ago.

Republican political consultant Dave Gilliard, who is spearheading the Electoral

College initiative effort, has insisted for the past month that local elections officials

could speed up the random counting process so the initiative could qualify for the

June election by a Jan. 24 state deadline.

But such an assumption may be unreasonable because county registrars already

have committed workers to prepare for the Feb. 5 election, said Stephen Weir,

registrar of voters in ContraCostaCounty and president of the California Association

of Clerks and Election Officials.

Counties are slammed with duties that include mailing ballots to overseas voters,

preparing ballot guides, training poll workers and gearing up for absentee voting

that begins Jan. 7. At the same time, many county election offices are juggling staff

vacation time around the holidays.

"They're risking it, honestly," Weir said of Gilliard's initiative effort. "They're risking it.

They're up against a tidal wave of programming. ... You can't miss deadlines when

you have a live election going."

Democrats have charged that the initiative is a ploy to ensure Republicans obtain

20 or more electoral votes in California, a state no GOP presidential candidate

has won since George H.W. Bush in 1988. But Republicans behind the initiative

said it would force presidential candidates to visit California more often and give

more voters a voice in the presidential outcome.

Gilliard and other GOP consultants took over the initiative drive in late October

after earlier proponents abandoned the proposal due to a lack of funding and a

questionable donation received from a Rudy Giuliani supporter.

They need 433,971 signatures to qualify their initiative for the ballot but are aiming

to collect roughly 700,000 to ensure they have enough valid petitions. Gilliard in

October had hoped to get the proposal on the June ballot but said he would shoot

for November 2008 if he could not meet deadlines for the earlier election.

Gilliard did not return repeated phone calls Monday, but wrote in an e-mail,

"We are still hopeful of making the June ballot but understand we are at the mercy

of the calendar."

He estimated a week ago that his campaign had more than 500,000 signatures

and was hoping to turn them in by Monday. He estimated that his campaign had

collected $1.3 million.

Political analysts believe the initiative would fare better in June because it is

expected to have a low turnout, which generally hurts Democratic causes. Gilliard

believes the initiative would still affect the 2008 presidential outcome if it is on the

same November ballot, but opponents disagree.

Bowen's office gives counties eight working days to verify that proponents have

submitted the bare minimum of signatures required to pass. At that point, the

secretary of state authorizes counties to begin conducting a random sample of

signatures to verify their validity, a process that can take up to 30 working days.

Counties are required to submit random sample results to Bowen by Jan. 22.

As of Tuesday, there are only 33 working days until that deadline, five fewer

than counties are given to complete their raw counts and random samples.

If the random sampling does not begin by Friday, counties are free to finish their

counting after Jan. 22 and the initiative could miss the June ballot.

"There's a whole bunch of things we're trying to do for February besides this

initiative," said Brad Buyse, campaign services manager for SacramentoCounty's

elections office. "So it would be wise of them to turn (signatures) in because of

Christmas, New Year's and the February election. Many counties may use every

day that's allotted to them."

Weir said that staff members who would normally have time to verify petitions

will likely be swamped with registering voters and other last-minute election activities.

"I'm telling you, your data-entry people are going to be focusing on that and will

focus on petitions when they have the time," Weir said.

Chris Lehane, who is leading the Democratic effort to oppose the initiative,

said he believes initiative proponents are a long shot to qualify for June at this point.

"They have alternatively talked about shooting for November (2008), which

would appear to be what they're focusing on now if they're moving forward at all,

" Lehane said. "Whether it's June or November, we will defeat it no matter which

ballot it shows up on."

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CBS News

Calif. Measure Would Split Electoral Votes CBS News, NY - Dec 1, 2007 While California, like most states, is winner take all, a proposed initiative would slice the state's electoral votes up by district. ...

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Electoral College campaign still needs signatures

Backers of plan to alter California's winner-take-all vote miss deadlines.

By Dan Morain            December 1, 2007     Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

SACRAMENTO — As deadlines came and went, backers of an initiative

that could affect the 2008 presidential election continued struggling Friday

to gather enough signatures to place the measure before voters.

Organizers had set this week as a deadline for wrapping up their petition

drive, but said they had not raised the roughly $2 million needed to pay

petition circulators. Secretary of State Debra Bowen had recommended a

deadline of Nov. 29.

Campaign manager Dave Gilliard said that agents would work through the

weekend to obtain the 434,000 valid signatures required to put the Electoral

College initiative on next June's ballot and that he expected to submit the

names by midweek.

Gilliard was less than certain that he would reach his goal of 700,000

names, a number allowing leeway for signatures that might be disqualified.

"We won't know until they're collected," he said.

The proposed initiative would alter California's winner-take-all system of

awarding its 55 electoral votes. Instead, electors would be allocated based

on which candidate captured majorities in individual congressional districts.

That could help the eventual Republican presidential nominee in California.

With Republicans holding 19 congressional seats, the GOP nominee would

presumably win at least that many districts, giving the candidate 19 electoral

votes, almost as many as Ohio has.

In 2004, President Bush, a Republican, won majorities in 22 congressional

districts, despite losing to Democratic U.S. Sen. John Kerry in California

44.4% to 55.4%.

If California altered its Election Code to count electoral votes by congressional

district, the state would join just two others using that method: Maine and

Nebraska, which combined have nine electoral votes.

Gilliard said Friday that he was unsure whether the campaign would reach its

fund-raising goal.

Tapping some Republican stalwarts, proponents have raised more than $1 million;

the actual figure won't become public for several days. But Gilliard said $200,000

to $250,000 more was needed to pay circulators for the signatures they have gathered.

"Until it is the bank, I don't want to make any pronouncements," he said.

Initiative organizers often miss deadlines and still qualify their measures, but pushing

the target date is risky. Once signatures are submitted, local elections authorities

must verify them and send them to the secretary of state, who certifies the measure

for the ballot.

The initiative has attracted interest among presidential campaigns because

of its national implications.

Democratic National Party Chairman Howard Dean has said that Democrats

could not win the White House without winning all California's 55 electoral votes.

This state accounts for more than 10% of the 538 electoral votes nationally,

by far the biggest block of any state.

Backers have said that if they failed to qualify the Electoral College measure

for June, they would try to place it on the November 2008 ballot. It is unclear

what that would mean for that month's presidential election.

The Electoral College initiative has had a troubled past. Its original campaign

team, including its author, Sacramento attorney Thomas Hiltachk,

abandoned the measure in October.

Hiltachk and his team had been unable to raise sufficient money.

Hiltachk also became angry when the one donation he received -- $175,000

from Wall Street mogul Paul E. Singer -- took a circuitous route through a

Missouri attorney and a hitherto unknown corporation. That route hid,

at least for a time, the true source of the contribution.

The measure itself is relatively simple, taking fewer than four pages.

Supporters portray it as a way to make California's elections fair.

The idea of altering California's system has been discussed within

Republican circles for years.

It became so serious in the 2004 campaign that California

Republicans approached the Republican National Committee about it.

But the GOP and President Bush's political team concluded that

Bush could win the election without the added boost that such a

move would bring.

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NEW !   LEADING A MOVEMENT TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE

Richard K. Wagner, President, Lincoln Club of Orange County

 

The Lincoln Club of Orange County Board of Directors has voted

decisively to endorse and support the California Counts Electoral

College Reform initiative.  Agreeing to contribute $100,000 to the

cause, the Board felt that for far too long, too many voters in

California have not been counted in Presidential elections.

 

For over 45 years the Lincoln Club has been at the forefront of

most of the major issues confronting California.  It was initial

support and funding of club members that helped launch Ronald

Reagan's 1966 gubernatorial campaign.  In 1978 early seed

money and support by the club helped allow for Proposition 13

to proceed to the ballot. 

 

In 2003 it was a $200,000 commitment along with the club's good

name that helped to launch the recall of Gray Davis. 

In most instances, the club acted only after substantial, and

sometimes heated, debate, and this vote was no exception.

 

The greatest cause for concern by some club members was the

idea of reforming the Electoral College process in California. 

Taking the state from a winner-take-all to one where electors are

chosen by Congressional district caused great angst.  In fact only

a month ago most board members were against this initiative for

just this reason.  However the debate established some solid

arguments as to why this initiative should be considered and

supported, and the reasons had nothing to do with trickery or

slight of hand with regards to the election process.

 

First, California is an aberration in relation to the rest of the country. 

There are 38 million people in the state of which 22 million are eligible

to vote, and around 15 million are actually registered.  About 43% or

6.5 million of these are Democrats, and about 36% or 5.5 million of

these are Republicans.  In a winner-take-all scenario, 5 to 6 million

Republican votes in the nation's largest state are as good as uncounted

in every Presidential election, and this greatly bothered the board.

 

Second, most candidates for President do not campaign in the

state for votes and simply use it for raising money.  By establishing a

process whereby electors are chosen by Congressional district,

California then sets itself up as a number of states within a state,

thus forcing candidates to spend time here.  For example, Orange

County incorporates roughly five Congressional districts, or as many

Electoral College votes as West Virginia. 

In effect, Orange County becomes a state, as does San Diego, L.A., the

Inland Empire area of San Bernardino/Riverside, the Central Valley,

and the Bay area.

 

Third, the idea that all states will follow suit and begin diluting down the

effect of the Electoral College doesn't make sense.  Why would West

Virginia, with only five Electoral College votes, make itself less attractive

by not having a winner-take-all process? 

The idea of a winner-take-all process was not something board members

had a problem with.  It just seemed that in the mega-nation state of

California, it no longer makes sense.

 

Fourth, the Founding Fathers, in framing the Constitution, were specific

that the states, not the federal government, could each individually

determine how their respective Electoral College votes would be

apportioned.  Club members felt that this in and of itself was a built-in

check and balance on the Electoral College process, whereby a state

has the ability to adjust and change as required to ensure the proper

representation of its voters.  This is a Federalist approach,

and the Lincoln Club believes that the time to adjust has arrived.

 

Fifth, and last, one of the prominent ideas behind the formation of the

Electoral College was to level the playing field between states so that

the larger states would not be able to impose their will time and again

over the smaller states.  The situation we find ourselves in today is that

a few extremely large states in the winner-take-all column are having a

greater impact on elections than ever before.  Club members felt that

the Founding Fathers would be aghast at the size and influence of just

a small number of states, and that they would be in support of the kind

of political readjustment that the California Counts initiative proposes.

 

The Lincoln Club believes that California is just too big for a winner-take-

all process, and that the California Counts initiative solves the

representation problem without compromising the integrity of the Electoral

College process.  We think that the Founding Fathers would approve of

this initiative - one that makes votes count.

_________________________________________________________

 

 

NEW!! Electoral change is hope for GOP   November 26, 2007 03:29:39 AM


By Ben van der Meer    bvandermeer@modbee.com

 

     There used to be a phrase to describe a certain breed of California voter:
Reagan Democrats.
     Those were the moderate-to-conservative members of the Democratic Party
who supported President Reagan and the first President Bush in the elections
of 1980, 1984 and 1988. But for many reasons, Republican candidates have
written off their chances here ever since.
     Now a coalition of reformers -- with funding from state Republicans -- is hoping
to make California an important state for the GOP again, by tweaking how
electoral votes are apportioned.
     If a ballot measure to that end goes before voters next year, and it succeeds,
battleground states like Ohio and Michigan could be no more important than
some regions of California, such as the moderate Northern San Joaquin Valley.
     Let's go back. The proposed measure, called the Electoral Reform California
Initiative, is based on similar practices in Nebraska and Maine.
      In those states, every congressional district is worth one electoral vote.
The candidate who wins the popular vote in a district receives an electoral vote.
Two electoral votes, representing the state's two senators, go to whoever wins
the statewide vote.
     Here, that would mean California's 55 electoral votes -- the most in the nation
-- would be split between the Democrat and the Republican candidates, rather
than all going to the state winner.
     If that were in play in 2004, President Bush would've gotten 21 electoral votes
in California, to Sen. John Kerry's 34. That's one more electoral vote than Bush
won in Ohio, which gave him a second term.
      The thinking, according to the ballot measure's author, former state
Sen. Ray Haynes, is that candidates of both stripes would campaign in
California if they think they can pick up electoral votes in some of the
congressional districts.
      What does that mean for the valley?
Haynes thinks it means candidate visits from both sides.
"California is unique in this country," he said. "Those who like the status quo
don't want to work for electoral votes."
     Swing parts of the state, such as Modesto, could be attractive to candidates
who can't take it for granted, as Democrats discovered to their chagrin back
in the 1980s.
      State Democrats, predictably, vow to defeat the measure if it makes the June
2008 ballot. But the proposal may have some other handicaps, as well. Haynes
said as many as 10 districts in California are competitive, suggesting they would
be the districts candidates from both parties would target.
     Realistically, though, those districts are drawn so that in most cases, the party
currently representing them stays in power. Since redistricting in 2001, only one
congressional seat statewide changed parties, the 11th Congressional District
last year.
     And the measure doesn't have unanimous support within the Republican Party.
Gov. Schwarzenegger has seemed disinclined to support it, and local
Republicans said the prospects of it making the state ballot are iffy.
     Then there's early polling that shows most voters are cool to or don't support
the idea. With statewide propositions, being behind in the polls at the start is
considered bad mojo, though Haynes pointed out that 1978's Proposition
13 also started behind but passed in a landslide.
     Even if the measure doesn't pass, it may have other value for the Republicans.
State Democrats are flush with cash; but state Republicans, not so much.
     If Democrats have to pony up to make sure this measure doesn't pass, that
could level the playing field somewhat.
      With a national presidential race and a handful of state congressional races
in play, money thrown at a ballot measure fight is money that can't be spent
where the party might need it more.
      In a weird way, the proposal could reverse California's standing in presidential
politics: Rather than pick up money here, Democrats might have to spend it.


INITIATIVE UPDATE !

     Just two weeks ago, the Reform Initiative was

destined to join many other great ideas that never

made the ballot due to lack of money, organization

or time.

     Today, thanks to the generous support from donors

and herculean efforts from everyone working on the

measure, I am very happy to inform that we are well

on our way to qualifying the Electoral Reform California

Initiative 07-0032 for the June 3, 2008 ballot.

     Here is the update:

     We have gathered a total of nearly 400,000 signatures
(300,000 over the last two weeks).  Our paid signature effort

is proving enormously successful – so much so that we

were able to decrease the price we are paying circulators

on the street – an almost unprecedented situation for an

initiative campaign working on a deadline.
We are getting thousands of signatures from the internet,
and mail thanks to a massive internet/email campaign from
Congressman Darrell Issa.
     The California Republican Party and our CalCounts
Committee have mailed petitions to a total of over
750,000 households statewide.
     Our volunteer signature efforts and $2 bounty program
are starting to produce signatures and we expect some
big returns from that program over the next couple of weeks.
     Polling continues to show that Californians support our Initiative.
A new SurveyUSA poll shows that 47% support choosing delegates

by congressional district.  Only 34% of voters want to keep the

current winner-take-all system.   The more voters are

informed about the initiative, the stronger they support it.
    We need about 434,000 valid signatures to qualify this
initiative. Our goal remains to submit well over 600,000
signatures before the end of the month. We are well on
our way, but we need everyone to double their efforts to
help us put the Electoral Reform Initiative before
voters in June.

                              Thank you!
           Dave Gilliard, Manager, California Counts

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Electoral Reform Initiative is legal and liberals are full of baloney!

 

by James Lacy, Attorney -Politcal Law        11-2-2007 and 10-29-2007

   There is a report in the Sacramento Bee today that Art Torres, Chair

of the California Democratic Party, is claiming that the PERA initiative,

O7-0032 which would reform California's apportionment of electoral college votes to

recognize regional diversity and make our state relevant again in Presidential elections,

is unconstitutional. 
      That position is a bunch of baloney.

    Long established U.S. Supreme Court case law (see Smiley v. Holm, 285 U.S. 355

(1931) and Davis v. Hildebrant, 241 U.S. 565 (1911) ) provide strong logic and support

for the initiative.  Those cases establish rock-solid support for the proposition that the

word "legislature" in Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution, dealing with apportionment of
Congressional districts for election purposes, includes the lawmaking process in the

state as determined by its particular "polity."  In these cases, "legislature" in Article 1

was interpreted to include not only the state legislature itself, but the full lawmaking

process, including the Governor's veto, and the people's power of referendum.

      In California, all power, including the power to act as the "legislature," is reserved

to the people in our state constitution.  The "polity" of our lawmaking process includes

initiatives, and the initiative process in California was placed in the state constitution

about the time of the Smiley and Davis cases.  Court's are compelled to follow Supreme
Court precedent, and there is very strong logic that the same analysis actually applied

by the Supreme Court under Article 1 to Congressional elections will be applied under

a review of the "California Counts" initiative under Article 2 for Presidential elections of

the Constitutionally coequal Executive branch.  In other words, these same rules apply

to the coequal Congressional and Executive Powers, and if the Supreme Court already

has determined that referenda is action of the "legislature" in Ohio (under Article 1), then

Courts will find that initiative is action of the "legislature" in California (under Article 2).

        Loyola Law Professor Rick Hasen is quoted in the article.  Rick provides a fine

service for election lawyers through his blog.  And Rick is a brilliant lawyer.  Rick states

the law accurately in the news report.  Rick tries to be neutral, but he has been associated

with liberal legal causes in the past, and I believe he has greatly underplayed the Article

1/Article 2 "coequal" analysis, which is such a strong argument that even reluctant

observers who understand the law should agree that even in a close call (which it is not),

the likelihood is a reviewing court will uphold the California Counts initiative, and

California will be relevant again in Presidential elections.
10-29-2007   

     The Federal Constitution states at Article II, Section 1 that states shall "appoint, in

any manner as the Legislature therof may direct, a Number of Electors" for the purpose

of electing the President and Vice-President of the United States.
     The California Constitution empowers the people of the state at Article II with "all

inherent political power" to act as the legislature through the initiative process to

"propose statutes and amendments..." and to "adopt or reject them."
      In California, the Legislature is not the exclusive source of legislative power; the

constitution also includes the people's powers of initiative and referendum. 

Professional Engineers in California Government v. Kempton (2007) 56 Cal.Rptr.3d 814,

40 Cal.4th 1016, 155 P.3d 226. 
     The people's reserved power of initiative is greater than power of the legislature.

Rossi v. Brown (1995) 38 Cal.Rptr.2d 363, 9 Cal.4th 688, 889 P.2d 557.  

All presumptions favor the validity of initiative measures. California Family Bioethics

Council v. California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (App. 1 Dist. 2007) 55 Cal.

Rptr.3d 272, 147 Cal.App.4th 1319, review denied.  The initiative power must be
liberally construed to promote the democratic process. California Assn. of Retail

Tobacconists v. State of California (App. 4 Dist. 2003) 135 Cal.Rptr.2d 224, 109 Cal.

App.4th 792, review denied.  The voters' power to decide whether or not the Legislature

can amend or repeal initiative statutes is absolute and includes the power to enable
legislative amendment subject to conditions attached by the voters.

Professional Engineers in California Government v. Kempton (2007)

56 Cal.Rptr.3d 814, 40 Cal.4th 1016, 155 P.3d 226.

      The Presidential Elector Reform Initiative is a needed reform that will guarantee that

California's diversity will be represented in the Electoral College, and also make

California relevant in the presidenital election process.  Other states, such as Maine

and Nebraska, have similar laws.  The proposed California initiative, as stated above,

is also strongly supported by the legal authorities and the Federal and state constitution. 

All voters need to do to make this necessary reform happen is

sign the petition and then vote "Yes" in June!

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Art Torres: The big bad wolf!

______________________________________________________
    Dump winner-take-all!    Los Angeles Times, October 28, 2007
The states should divvy up electoralvotes so people

are more accurately represented.By Alexander Keyssar

The effort by some California Republicans to alter the way the

state's electoral votes are distributed in presidential elections

has been miraculously resurrected.

The proposal -- which would replace the winner-take-all system

with an allocation of electoral votes by congressional districts

had stalled last month in the wake of a strangely surreptitious

financial contribution to the cause from a Rudy Giuliani backer.

The proposal had also faced a ferocious assault from Democrats

(especially Clintonians) who fought it with money, focus groups,

radio ads and red-hot rhetoric, insisting that the proposed reform

was nothing but a "power grab" by Republicans, a dangerous and

blatant ploy designed to rig an election through procedural trickery.

But now it's back.

Last week, a new group of experienced organizers said not only

was it reviving the initiative but it would spend "whatever it takes"

to get the proposal onto the June ballot. Democrats began crying

foul again, worried that Republican electoral votes from California

in the 2008 election could go from zero (under the winner-take-all

system in this majority Democratic state) to as many as 19 (the

number of districts that have elected GOP members of Congress).

But this partisan battle for short-term advantage between Democrats

and Republicans in California ought not obscure the larger truth:

The strange method of electing presidents under which we currently

operate needs to be fixed. The way the system works is, in fact,

subject to partisan manipulation that could be decisive in a close

election. Florida. Right now, any state legislature could legally

decide to apportion its state's electoral votes in almost any way

it wants -- "winner take all" (the system currently used in most

states), or by district (as happens in Maine and Nebraska), or in some

other as-yet-undetermined fashion. In late November 2000, for

instance, Florida's Republican-controlled Legislature seriously

considered ignoring the disputed popular vote altogether and

choosing electors by itself.

A bit of history suggests that this should not surprise us.

The winner-take-all system of allocating electoral votes

-- which we now accept as normal and which awards all of a

state's electoral votes to the candidate who wins a majority

of the popular vote in the state -- was itself the product of

partisan maneuvers, put into place by politicians of different

parties, including our revered founding father and democratic

hero, Thomas Jefferson.

The Constitution drafted in Philadelphia in 1787 said (and says)

nothing about how a state should choose its electors or apportion

electoral votes. It leaves that decision to the legislature of each

state. Not surprisingly, when political leaders were first trying to

erect the institutions that the founding fathers had sketched on

paper in Philadelphia, different states adopted different methods

of choosing presidential electors. In some, the legislatures

appointed electors by themselves (without holding any popular

election); others developed a winner-take-all system in which

they held "general ticket" elections, granting the winning

candidate all of the state's electoral votes; still others allocated

the electors by district. Numerous states changed systems

from one election to the next.

The most progressive political thinking of the era favored the

district plan -- because it would most closely link the preferences

of voters to the selection of electors. As Jefferson observed,

"All agree that an election by districts would be best, if it could

be general."

Yet Jefferson proved more than willing to let partisan advantage

trump what "would be best." As the 1800 election approached,

his Republican supporters in Virginia, mindful that their opponents

in the Federalist Party had won five of the state's electoral votes

in 1796, replaced the district system with "winner take all"

-- thereby guaranteeing Jefferson all of Virginia's electoral votes.

(Massachusetts, the home of Jefferson's rival, John Adams,

retaliated by entrusting the selection of electors to the Federalist-

dominated legislature.) A few years later, Jefferson, as president,

backed away from supporting a constitutional amendment

mandating a district system throughout the nation -- a strategy

that would have eliminated the potential unfairness of having a

district approach in some states and the winner-take-all system

in others -- because "winner take all" appeared to be benefiting

his party.

Indeed, "winner take all" became, and endured as, the primary

method of choosing electors precisely because of partisan

dynamics. Regardless of the broader democratic principles at

stake, dominant parties in nearly all individual states had

embraced the short-run advantages of "winner take all" by

1830; since then, few states have had an appetite for dividing

up their electoral votes while everyone else was using "winner

take all" -- in part because doing so would appear to lessen the

state's clout in national politics. (Democrats in Michigan made

the change in the 1890s and were severely punished for their

pains after Republicans regained control of the state legislature.)

National efforts to impose a district plan (or a similar system

that would allocate electoral votes in proportion to the

distribution of the popular vote within a state) have occasionally

garnered widespread support (several times winning passage

through one branch of Congress), but, so far, partisan opponents

of such a change have successfully prevented such a

constitutional amendment from receiving the necessary

two-thirds vote in both houses of Congress.

All of which has left us with a winner-take-all system that was

never voted on or designed as a matter of national policy and

has numerous intrinsic defects (such as transforming presidential

elections into nonevents in the many states where candidates

don't bother to campaign because the outcome is not in doubt).

We are also left with a constitutional framework that remains

vulnerable to partisan machinations. That framework, created

by men of the 18th century who could barely imagine mass

political parties, permits the rules of the game to be changed

in midstream by any one state or any collection of states.

The largest states, of course, would be particularly inviting

targets.

If the Republicans truly believe that it would be fairer and

more democratic to choose electors by district, then instead

of introducing such plans piecemeal in states where they

would benefit, they should introduce a constitutional amendment

to create a national district system -- one that would apply to

Texas and South Carolina as well as California. And if the

Democrats truly want to prevent procedural "power grabs,

" they should sign on to such a proposal -- or offer a

"proportional plan" or (better yet) actively back a national

popular election that would eliminate the electoral college

altogether.

If both parties worked together on such legislation, jointly

committing themselves to remedy a design flaw in our

Constitution, they might even succeed in dissipating a bit

of the cynicism that the electorate so frequently expresses

about political parties that seem far more interested in their

own welfare than the fate of the nation.

Alexander Keyssar is a professor of history and social policy

at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.

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Will changing the how we elect presidents be the latest California trend?

BY RHODES COOK       Wall Street Journal

Wednesday, October 17, 2007       12:01 a.m.

     It would not be surprising if the most important single primary in 2008 takes

place in California. But don't look for it to be the presidential primary on

Super-Duper Tuesday Feb. 5. Look instead to the state primary on June 3,

up to now a low-profile event that could become fraught with significance if

some California Republicans succeed in getting a highly controversial

proposition on the ballot.

     If successful, it would ensure the party's nominee 20 or so electoral votes

from California next fall, even if the GOP candidate loses the state for the fifth

straight election. And if the 2008 election is as close as the last two have been,

that could be enough to keep the White House in Republican hands.

     The political weapon of choice for the GOP is a plan that would distribute

electoral votes to congressional district winners (one per district, plus two to

the statewide winner of the popular vote) instead of the winner-take-all format that

nearly every state currently favors. The plan was submitted as a ballot proposal

to California election officials in July by a law firm that has represented the state

Republican Party.

     The district plan has been employed for years by two small states, Maine and

Nebraska, with results consistently the same as winner-take-all. But if the plan

were applied in California in 2004, the state's electoral vote would have shifted

dramatically--from 55-0 for Democrat John Kerry (a 10 percentage point winner

in the state's popular vote) to 33-22 Kerry, with Bush taking one electoral vote

for each of the 22 congressional districts that he carried.

     In one swoop, Bush would have won more electoral votes in California than he

did in capturing the highly priced battleground state of Ohio (worth 20 electors).

     And in one instant, the nationwide electoral vote tally would have shifted in

Bush's favor from 286-251 (with one "faithless" Democratic elector in Minnesota)

to a more commanding 317-221. The district plan would have transformed

Bush's narrow Electoral College victory--where Kerry could have won the

election by taking Ohio--into a decisive triumph.

     If applied nationally over the last generation, the district plan would have

reversed the outcome of the 1960 election, electing Richard Nixon rather than

John F. Kennedy, would have produced a 269-269 electoral vote tie between

Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford in 1976, and would have consistently tightened

the Electoral College outcomes in every presidential election from 1960 to the

end of the 20th century--with the winning candidate losing electoral votes and

the losing candidate gaining some each time.

     However, in both 2000 and 2004, the district plan would have actually expanded

George W. Bush's electoral vote margins--from a razor-thin five in 2000 to 38,

and from 35 in 2004 to 96.

*****************************************************

The Hillary's gang of pirates know that this

initiative will kill her chances to be president! 

Be aware. Look up "Lincoln Brigade" of the 30/40s.

Members were the Industrial Workers of the World, "Wobblies",  socialist, and anarchist organizations.

State Dem group played hardball to kill GOP election system plan

Carla Marinucci, Chronicle Political Writer

Sunday, October 7, 2007

 

They called themselves "The Lincoln Brigade."

Even as Democrats feared having to spend as much as $40 million for a bruising, bloody fight expected to

drag on for months, this makeshift group of California Democratic operatives needed just weeks to pummel

a Republican-funded push for a ballot measure that threatened to change the outcome of the 2008 presidential election.

The ruthlessly effective battle plan of the California Democrats' group raises the specter that, as the 2008 election looms, Republicans may have to confront a far more aggressive Democratic ground game that has revived the

old "Clinton war room" philosophy.

"We need to fight back and not be reluctant - that if they come after you with a knife, to pull out a gun," said

California Democratic strategist Chris Lehane, former spokesman for President Bill Clinton's White House and

Vice President Al Gore's 2000 presidential campaign.

The group took aim at the Presidential Election Reform Act, a proposed California ballot measure that would

change the way the state apportions its Electoral College votes and likely benefit the Republican nominee.

After two terms of Republican control of the White House - and angered by what they perceived as a history

of electoral "dirty tricks" by GOP strategists such as President Bush's key adviser Karl Rove - the Democrats'

response in California could serve as an indication of what lies ahead in the 2008 battle for the White House.

"We ran it like a military operation," says Margie Sullivan, a former chief of staff to three Clinton Cabinet

secretaries who was closely involved in the effort. "You had this SWAT team of talented, hyper-engaged people.

 ... It was: boom, boom, boom."

Lehane and Sullivan are some of the lead players in the group, which includes many former insiders from the

Clinton administration. They named their group after the brigade of American volunteers who fought against

fascism in the Spanish Civil War.

After events such as the 2000 Florida presidential election recount, the 2003 California recall election that ousted

Democratic Gov. Gray Davis, the 2004 "Swift Boat" campaign against Sen. John Kerry, "Democrats are waking

up to reality, " said Doug Boxer, the son of U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer and a Bay Area consultant who was political

director for the effort against the ballot measure.

"It doesn't mean (Democrats are) jettisoning their values system ... but the Clinton administration played hardball

on a lot of things, and we'd gotten away from that," Boxer said. "We're back to the Clinton era."

Veteran California Republican strategist Dan Schnur conceded that the recent Democratic effort against the ballot

measure was astonishingly effective. But he argued that the result - Republican supporters have for the most part

backed away from the measure - may have been due more to the high stakes and a hunger to get back into the

White House than brilliant campaign strategy.

"There's an old saying: Nothing concentrates your attention like the prospect of your own destruction," Schnur

said. "They correctly identified this as a mortal blow to their Electoral College prospects next year. If they hadn't

mobilized with everything they had, they would have been signing their own death warrant."

Interviews with lead players in the effort last week reinforced that scenario: Democrats from local to national levels

shifted into gear almost as soon as rumors surfaced in May that Republicans might try to "steal the election" in the

Democratic-leaning state with a ballot measure to benefit the GOP nominee.

Instead of the winner-take-all system used in all but two states, the measure provided that 53 of California's 55

electoral colleges votes would go one-by-one to the presidential candidate who wins each of the state's 53

congressional districts.

Analysts said such a change could swing about 20 of California's Electoral College votes - about as many as key

states such as Ohio and Pennsylvania - from the Democratic candidate, who would be favored to win the statewide

popular vote, to the Republican candidate who could win Republican-dominated congressional districts.

By the time the GOP-backed group called "Californians for Equal Representation," led by attorney Thomas Hiltachk

- who has represented Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the state GOP - submitted the ballot measure to the state

attorney general's office on July 17, the ad-hoc Democratic group was already engaged in a flurry of action.

Lehane had contacted Sullivan and Tom Steyer, a longtime major party donor and lead fundraiser for Kerry who

heads San Francisco-based Farallon Capitol.

"He said, 'We've got to stop this - now' ... and immediately kicked in $150,000," Lehane recalled.

They roused a crew of party operatives including Peter Ragone, longtime aide to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom,

who acknowledged that many believed the GOP effort was a longshot.

But "we'd seen that movie before," Ragone said. "We had learned ... that when Republicans start with these shenanigans,

you have to hit them hard. Our attitude was: Not in our state."

The goal, Sullivan said, was to "strangle the baby in the cradle" and kill the ballot measure early, rather than let it

qualify for the ballot - where it would be much tougher and more expensive to beat.

As the campaign in favor of the measure prepared to circulate the petitions and get the voter signatures needed to

qualify it for the ballot, Doug Boxer contacted every major Democratic elected official from mayors to state legislators

to California's U.S. senators and urged them to speak publicly against the Electoral College plan.

Steyer and Sullivan hit the phones, rounding up financial backing and commitments from deep-pocketed donors like

Nancy Parrish, a leading supporter of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign and Hollywood producer

Norman Lear, who put up $50,000. Also at the ready: producer Steven Bing and major Democratic donor and developer

Walter Shorenstein, Sullivan said.

Pollster Paul Maslin's early focus groups found that a slim majority of Californians initially backed the Republicans'

call for an end to "winner take all," so the Democrats began a daily drumbeat aimed at the media - press conferences,

meeting with the state's leading editorial boards and outreach to Internet Web sites and blogs.

The Democrats wanted to "tell our side of the story" additionally through TV and radio ads to erode public support

and scare off potential GOP donors, Lehane said.

At one point, "Norman Lear pitched in on a script change," Lehane said. "That made us nervous ... it's was kind of

like Picasso giving you advice on painting."

Frank Russo, publisher of the California Progress Report, a popular Democratic Web site, said the strategy achieved

"a clarion call that went out to all the troops," prompting netroots activists such as the Courage Campaign and Daily

Kos loyalists to pound the issue to the grassroots. "It was like the old Who song: We won't get fooled again," he said.

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean flew to San Francisco for a press conference with labor leaders

to "make it very clear from the beginning that the new Democratic Party is not going to take it lying down - we still stand

and fight," said DNC spokesman Karen Finney.

Editorial boards lined up against the measure. Then came a turning point - Schwarzenegger's public slap at the measure,

which he said suggested a "loser mentality" by his party and an attempt to change election rules in the middle of the game.

Democrats still felt they had a big challenge: unmasking the money people behind Hiltachk's group - which by early

September had said it had collected 40,000 signatures to put the measure on the June 2008 ballot.

Many of the original backers of the GOP ballot measure also were supporters of GOP presidential candidate Rudy

Giuliani. Then came the news that the single $175,000 contribution to Hiltachk's Sacramento group was from a separate

organization run by a Missouri GOP attorney named Charles Hurtt III - another Giuliani donor. But Hurtt's group wouldn't

reveal its donors.

Democratic attorney James Harrison announced the party would file a complaint with federal election officials alleging

money laundering - and the state's Fair Political Practices Commission acknowledged looking into the issue.

Quickly, the GOP ballot measure drive collapsed. Hiltachk resigned - as did his group's spokesman, Kevin Eckery and

the chief fundraiser, Marty Wilson. They said they didn't want to accept money from anonymous donors - and support

and funding had dried up for the measure.

In the last week, the money man behind the Missouri group was revealed to be Giuliani policy adviser and top fundraiser,

billionaire New York hedge fund executive Paul Singer. That has prompted Harrison to pledge that Democrats will continue demanding answers regarding Giuliani's links to the effort - right into the 2008 primary season.

Eckery, the former spokesman for the ballot measure group, said that while the experience served as "a tune-up for the

Clinton machine in California," Democrats shouldn't get overconfident from the result.

"Politics is a contact sport," he said, "and the presidential election is the Super Bowl."

Cast of characters

Some of the key Lincoln Brigade players and their Clinton connections:

Chris Lehane: former White House spokesman for President Bill Clinton and 2000 spokesman for Al Gore's presidential

campaign. Lehane is supporting Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential effort.

Doug Boxer: consultant and son of U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer of California.

Tom Steyer: founder of San Francisco's Farallon Capital Management, one of Sen. Clinton's biggest donors and a

leading fundraiser for 2004 John Kerry campaign.

Margie Sullivan: Farallon Capital management analyst, Democratic fundraiser and former chief of staff to three U.S.

Cabinet secretaries during the Clinton administration.

Ari Swiller: Democratic fundraiser and "kitchen cabinet" insider of Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a Hillary

Clinton backer.

Peter Ragone: a former aide in the Clinton administration and Gore spokesman. He is former spokesman for San

Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, a Clinton endorser.

Bill Carrick: longtime Democratic strategist for U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who has endorsed Hillary Clinton.

Paul Maslin: veteran Democratic pollster, formerly for Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean and

now for New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Democratic presidential candidate.

Sean Sullivan: opposition researcher formerly with the San Francisco firm of Averell "Ace" Smith, who is now

Hillary Clinton's California campaign manager.

E-mail Carla Marinucci at cmarinucci@sfchronicle.com.

 

Sept 2, 2007                          SFGate by Matthew Yi   

Field Poll shows Californians lean toward dividing

 electoral votes (47-35% favor. Dems terrified)

California voters are inclined to support a proposed ballot initiative that would

change how the Golden State allocates its electoral votes in presidential campaigns,

but they're not yet sold on the idea, a Field Poll released today showed.

 

Currently, California employs a winner-take-all system that awards the

state's entire 55 electoral votes to the winner of the state's popular vote.

 

Under the proposed measure, which could be on the June 2008 ballot, the

presidential election would become, in essence, a congressional district-by-

congressional district contest. The winner of the statewide popular vote

would receive two electoral votes, but the remaining votes would go to the

winner in each of the 53 congressional districts.

 

The proponents of the California ballot measure, largely Republicans, say such

a change would make presidential elections more fair by more accurately reflecting

the results of the popular vote. However, Democrats have railed against the proposal

by charging that the measure is a Republican-driven effort to keep Democrats from

capturing the White House.

 

If the proposal is adopted, analysts suggest that a Republican presidential candidate

would get a boost because Democrats can no longer count on all 55 electoral votes

from California, which has voted for Democratic candidates since 1988.

 

All but two states, Nebraska and Maine, give their electoral votes on a winner-take-all

basis to the presidential candidate who wins the statewide popular vote.

 

The Field Poll found that 47 percent of registered voters back a change to California's

system for electoral votes, with 35 percent opposed. Republicans generally support

the change more than Democrats.

 

When pollsters explained the political implication that Democratic presidential

candidates might lose some electoral votes under a proportional system, the

numbers changed: 49 percent supported the change and 42 percent opposed it.

Opposition from Democrats and independent voters rose when the issue was put this way.

 

Still, the survey showed there is "initial support for the idea to change the California's

system," said Mark DiCamillo, director of the Field Poll.

 

"I think voters on both sides tend to see the current winner-take-all to be a little bit

unfair," he said. "Even the Democrats in the first question (before political ramifications

were explained) were nearly evenly divided."

 

The poll of 536 registered voters taken Aug. 3-12 has a margin of error of plus or

minus 4.5 percentage points.

 

With California's 55 electoral votes representing the biggest single chunk of votes

in the presidential election, the proposed initiative - should it make the ballot - will

generate a huge partisan campaign fight.

 

"And I think there would be more involvement from outside the state than we've

ever seen in any other initiative in California," DiCamillo said.

 

Even though the proponents of the measure have yet to begin gathering signatures,

the battle lines have already been drawn.

 

A representative for the proponents of the measure said the results of the latest Field

Poll are encouraging.

 

However, the state's Democrats argue that the proposal is nothing but

a "right-wing power grab."

 

"Republicans are in disarray nationally right now. And in California, they aren't even

treading water. They'll do everything they can to steal the White House in 2008.

Our job is to make sure that we take it seriously and do everything we can to kill it,"

said Roger Salazar, a spokesman for the California Democratic Party.

*****************************************************

Republican Party has adopted our plan!

 

California Republican Presidential Primary

Will No Longer Be Winner-Take-All In 2008

 

       The California Republican Party has modified its rules, changing the

Golden State presidential primary from a winner-take-all contest to one

where most of the 173 available Republican delegates to the party's

national presidential nominating convention will be chosen by

winner-take-all within each Congressional District.

      Three delegates in each of the 53 congressional districts in California

will go to the Republican presidential candidate winning the most primary

votes within each Congressional District.

     There are three types of delegates:  Congressional District,

Republican at-large, and the Republican Party leadership.

      In 2008 California will have 159 Republican congressional delegates,

11 Republican at-large delegates, 3 Republican Party leader delegates.

The 3 Republican Party leader delegates are: RNC committeeman, RNC

committeewoman, and the state Republican Party chairman.

The 11 at-large delegates will go to the Republican presidential

candidate winning the most primary votes statewide.

     This relatively new California Republican primary system will clearly

put an increased emphasis on grass-roots organizing, though the

most efficient way to reach voters in the Golden State will remain

through television and radio advertising.

     But it will obviously allow lower-tier Republican presidential candidates

to cherry pick delegates in specific California Congressional Districts

where the political terrain favors their ideology, even if they dont have

the resources to compete statewide.

 

**********************************************************************

Historical Foundation        http://www.fec.gov/pdf/eleccoll.pdf

 

     The function of the College of Electors  in  choosing  the  president  can be  likened

to that in the Roman Catholic Church of the College of Cardinals selecting the Pope.

     The original idea was for the most  knowledgeable  and  informed  individuals 

from each State to select the president based solely on merit and without regard  to

State of origin or political party.The structure of the Electoral College can be traced

to the Centurial Assembly system of the Roman  Republic. 

     Under  that  system,  the  adult male citizens of Rome were divided, according to

their wealth,  into  groups  of  100 (called Centuries).

      Each group of 100 was entitled to  cast  only  one  vote  either  in favor or

against proposals submitted to them by the Roman Senate.

     In the Electoral College system, the States serve  as  the  Centurial  groups ( though

they are not, of course, based on wealth ),  and  the  number  of  votes  per  State  is

determined by the  size  of  each  State's  Congressional  delegation.  Still,  the  two

systems  are  similar  in  design  and  share  many  of  the  same   advantages   and

disadvantages.  The   similarities   between   the  Electoral   College  and   classical

institutions are not accidental. Many of the Founding Fathers were  well  schooled  in

ancient history and its lessons.

Historical Curiosities

In the evolution of the Electoral College, there have been some interesting developments and

remarkable outcomes. Critics often try to use these as examples of what can  go  wrong.  Yet

most of these historical curiosities were the result  of  profound  political  divisions  within  the

country which the designers of the Electoral  College  system  seem  to  have  anticipated  as

needing resolution at a higher level. In 1800, as previously noted, the Democratic-Republican

Electors gave both Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr an equal number of electoral votes.The

tie, settled in Jefferson's favor by the House of Representatives in accordance with the original

design of the Electoral College  system,  prompted  the  12 th  Amendment  which  effectively

prevented this sort ofthing from ever happening again.  In 1824, there were four fairly  strong

contenders  in  the  presidential  contest  ( Andrew  Jackson,  John  Quincy  Adams,  William

Crawford, and Henry Clay) each of whom represented an  important  faction  within  the  now

vastly dominant Democratic-Republican Party. The electoral votes were so divided amongst

them that no one received the necessary majority to become president (although the popular

John C. Calhoun did receive enough electoral votes to become vice president). In accordance

with the provisions of the 12th Amendment, the choice of president devolved upon the House

of Representatives who narrowly selected John Quincy Adams despite the fact  that  Andrew

Jackson had obtained the greater number ofelectoral votes. This  election  is  often  cited  as

the first one in which the candidate who obtained the greatest popular vote ( Jackson)  failed

to be elected president. The claim is a weak one, though, since six of the twenty  four  States

at the time still chose their Electors in the State legislature.

Some of these (such as sizable New York)  would  likely  have  returned  large  majorities  for

Adams had they conducted a popular election. The  1836  presidential  election  was  a  truly

strange  event.  The  developing  Whig  Party,  for example,   decided  to  run  three  different

presidential  candidates  ( William  Henry  Harrison,  Daniel  Webster,  and  Hugh  White ) in

 separate parts of the country. The idea was that their respective regional popularities would

ensure a Whig majority in the Electoral College which would then  decide  on a  single  Whig

presidential ticket. This fairly inspired scheme failed, though,  when  Democratic-Republican

candidate Martin Van Buren won an absolute majority of Electors. Nor  has  such  a  strategy

ever again been seriously attempted. Yet Van Buren himself did not escape the event entirely

unscathed. For while he obtained an electoral  majority,  his  vice  presidential  running  mate

( one Richard  Johnson )  was  considered  so  objectionable  by  some  of  the  Democratic-

Republican Electors that he  failed to  obtain  the  necessary  majority  of  electoral  votes  to

become vice president. In accordance  with  the  12th  Amendment,  the  decision  devolved

upon the Senate which chose Johnson as vice president anyway.  A  really  bizarre  election,

that one. In the 1872 election, Democratic candidate Horace Greeley (he ofearlier "Go West,

young man, go  West"  journalistic  fame  whose  nomination  makes  a  good  story  in  itself)

thoughtlessly died during that period between the popular vote for Electors  and  the  meeting

of the Electoral College. The Electors who were pledged to him, clearly unprepared  for  such

an  eventuality,  split  their  electoral  votes  amongst   several  other  Democratic  candidates

(including three votes for Greeley himself as a possible comment on  the  incumbent  Ulysses

S. Grant).  That hardly mattered,  though,  since  the  Republican  Grant  had  readily  won  an

absolutemajority of Electors.

Still, it was an interesting event for which the political parties are now  prepared.  In 1876, the

country once again found itself in serious political turmoilechoing, in some respects, both  the

economic divisions of 1824 and the impending political party realignments  of 1836,  but with  

the added bitterness of Reconstruction. A number of deep cross currents were  in  play. After

a vast economic expansion, the country had fallen into a deepdepression. Monetary and tariff

issues   were   eroding   the  Union   Republican  coalition  of  East  and  West  while  a  solid

Republican black vote eroded the traditional Democratic hold on  the  South.  The  incumbent

Republican administration of Grant  had  suffered  a  seemingly  endless  series  of  scandals

involving graft and corruption on a scale hitherto unknown. And the South was eager to put an

end to Radical Reconstruction which was, after all, a kind of  vast  political  mugging.  Against

this backdrop, the resurging Democratic Party easily nominated Samuel J. Tilden, the popular

Governor of New  York,  and  Thomas A.  Hendricks  of  Indiana (shrewd  geographic  choices

under the circumstances).  The  Republicans, in a  more  turbulent  convention,  selected  Ohio

Governor  Rutherford  B.  Hayes  and  William  A.  Wheeler  of  New  York.   A  variety  of  fairly

significant third parties also  cropped  up,  further  shattering  the  country's  political  cohesion.

This is about as good a prescription for electoral chaos as anyone might hope for. Indeed, it is

almost surprising that things did not turn out worse than they did. For on election night, it looked

as  though  Tilden  had  pulled  off the first Democratic presidential victory  since  the Civil War -

although the decisive electoral votes of South  Carolina,  Florida,  and  Louisiana  remained  in

balance. Yet these S tates  were  as  divided  internally  a s  was  the  nation  at  large.  Without

detailing the machinations of the vote count, suffice it to say that each State finally  delivered  to

the Congress two sets of electoral votes --one set for Tilden and one  set  for  Hayes.  Because

the Congressional procedures for resolving disputed sets of Electors had expired, the Congress 

established a special 15-member commission to decide the issue  ineach  of  the  three  States.

After much partisan intrigue, the special commission decided  (by  one  vote  in  each  case)  on

Hayes' Electors from all three States. Thus, Hayes waselected  president  despite  the  fact  that

Tilden,  by  everyone's   count,  had  obtained  a  slight  majority  of  popular  votes  ( although the

 difference was a mere 3% of the total vote cast). As a final note, the Congress enacted in  1887

legislation that delegated to each State the final authority to determine the legality  of  its  choice

of Electors and required a concurrent majority of both houses of Congress to reject any electoral

vote. That legislation remains in effect to this day so that the events of 1876 will not repeat them-

selves. Benjamin Harrison's election in 1888 is  really  the  only  clearcut  instance  in  which  the 

Electoral College vote went contrary to the popular vote. This happened because the incumbent,

Democrat Grover Cleveland, ran up huge popular majorities in  several  of  the 18  States  which

supported him while the Republican challenger, Benjamin Harrison, won only slender  majorities

in some of the larger of the 20 States which supported him (most  notably  in  Cleveland's  home

State of New York).  Even  so,  the  difference  between  them  was  only  110,476  votes  out  of

11,381,032  cast -- less than 1% of the total. Interestingly, in this  case,  there  were  few  critical

issues (other than tariffs) separating the candidates sothat  the  election  seems  to  have  been

fought -- and won -- more on the basis of superior party organization  in getting out the vote than

on the issues of the day.

*********************************************************************************************

Electoral College              

 

On four occasions  in  U.S.   history,  the   candidate  with   the most  popular votes

did not win the presidency. This is a feature  of  a  republican  form  of  government,

a government that is intended to "check"  popular   participation   and  "leveling"   or

democratic impulses. The mechanism by which this is done is the Electoral College.

The Electoral College also insures that the number of  parties  seriously  competing

for the presidency will always be and only be two.

Each State's allotment of electors is equal to  the  number   of   House   members to

which it is entitled plus two Senators. In  order to win  the  presidency,  a  candidate

must win a majority of electors, 270.

***************************************************************************
Single-Member Districts


Single-member districts simply mean that in any given congressional district, the winner takes all.

That is, if the Republicans get 39 percent in a  congressional  district  and the  Democrats get 35

percent and the Greens get  26 percent, the district will  still be represented  by a single  member,

in this case the Republican Elector. This is very democratic.

                                                                                                                                                                                     

 

In Maine and Nebraska, the winning candidate does not necessarily get all the electoral votes for

the state. The winning candidate in each House district gets one  electoral vote, then the  winning

candidate in the entire state gets two additional  electoral  votes,  representing the  two Senators.

The political power is returned to the grass roots of the citizenry with our proposal.

    This  doesn't  make  much difference  in  the  past,  because  all  districts  of  Nebraska   voted

Republican, and both districts of Maine voted Democrat. But if California were to  do  something

like this, it would have a huge effect on Presidential elections.

If such a system spread to many  states, there   would  be   more  campaigning  in   those  states, 

although there would never be a need for a nationwide recount, only in House districts where  the

vote was close. A system like this would also tend to avoid statewide  recounts,  unless the  total 

Electoral College vote was within two votes of a tie (which did occur in 2000).

**************************************************************************************************************

GOOD ARTICLES FOR REFERENCE

http://www.fec.gov/pdf/eleccoll.pdf


www.votescount.com/books/elecoll.htm


www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/ c/a/2004/10/03/INGI190IU01.DTL - 30k

 

***************************************************************** 

Senator Ray Haynes (ret)

August 29, 2007   

THE RIGHT WAY TO REFORM THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE!
      Since the 2000 election, proposals to reform or abolish the Electoral College

have proliferated throughout the country.  An initiative to change how

Californias votes are apportioned has been submitted to the Attorney General,

and the Democrats are going nuts.  The initiative, based on a Constitutional

Amendment that as a State Senator, I proposed in 2001, would award 53 of

Californias electoral votes to the candidate who receives the plurality of the

votes in each of the 53 Congressional Districts, and the remaining two would

be awarded to the candidate who receives a plurality of the statewide vote.
      Democrats are not opposed to reforming the Electoral College.  They have

made their own proposal, which was introduced by Assemblyman Tom Umberg

last year, and would award Californias Electoral College votes to the candidate


that wins the plurality of the nationwide vote.  His proposal would also require

other states to agree to this proposal before it would take effect.  The Democrats

proposal is also constitutionally suspect.
      The Electoral College system was created by the founding fathers because of

the fear that the smaller states had of the domination by the larger states of

New York, Virginia, and Massachusetts.  Much like the U.S. Senate, where each

state has two representatives, regardless of size or population, the Electoral

College awards votes to presidential candidates on a state-by-state basis. 

     The campaign for president, for this reason, becomes 50 state elections, where

campaign organizations in each state become critical, and the national "results"

are irrelevant.  In 1787, the smaller states believed this was critical to

protecting them from the larger states, and would give candidates from

smaller states an ability to run for president.   The Constitution allowed each

state to determine how its Electoral College votes would be apportioned.
      Quite frankly, election of electors on a state-by-state basis has worked

for this country.  Today, where large urban areas predominate, a popular vote

would have the presidential candidates spending all of their time in those large

urban areas.  Candidates would start in New York, fly to Chicago, Miami,

Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, and hit Dallas-Fort Worth, New Orleans

and Atlanta, and start all over again.  Iowa, Wisconsin, New Mexico, and several

other swing states would fall OFF the election map.  The Electoral College

requires these candidates to pay attention to small states in close elections,

because, as 2000 demonstrated, 2000 votes in Wisconsin, 500 votes in

New Mexico, or 900 votes in Florida could have changed the election outcome

for Al Gore.
      So, why award electoral votes on a Congressional District basis? 

First, it is constitutional.  It has been in effect in at least two states, Maine

and Nebraska, and has survived constitutional scrutiny.  It preserves the

integrity of the Electoral College system constructed by the founding fathers,

forcing candidates to pay attention to different states, and different areas of

those states, as opposed to just focusing on the large urban areas.  It respects

representative democracy.  In 2004, George Bush got 44 per cent of the

California vote, but not one Electoral College vote in California.   In California,

where approximately ten Congressional districts could be in play, candidates

in a close election would be forced to come to California and compete for votes,

not just campaign for money.  Under this system, the concerns of Fresno, or

Antioch, or Pomona, or San Diego would become just as important as

the concerns of Los Angeles or San Francisco to a presidential candidate.
      Finally, it would force the national parties to focus on state legislative elections. 

Winning the statehouse in a redistricting year would have an effect on the

presidential elections.  Fair redistricting would become a priority throughout

the country.
       The Reform of the Electoral College that preserves the Electoral Colleges

intent, but distributes the votes in a more democratic fashion strengthens the

American system of government, helping the large and small states equally. 

It is constitutional, democratic and it is FAIR.

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THE NATIONWIDE DISTRICT PLAN (Written in 1975)

     THIS PLAN retains the electoral vote allocation for each state and spells out a system of

electoral vote counting BY DISTRICT within each state.
     Electoral  districts  (which may or may  not be identical with congressional districts)  are

established.  The elector nominee, who receives a plurality of the popular vote within his or

her district, is elected.
     The proposals include electing two of the presidential electors at large within each state

 (corresponding to the election of senators). So each voter would vote for THREE ELECTORS,

one from his district and two at large. Other proposals create  electoral districts within each

state to match the total number of electors for the state.

EFFECTS OF THE DISTRICT PLAN
     Advocates of the district plan are convinced it would safeguard the federal system by

restoring and preserving between  RURAL  and  URBAN  areas and between large and

small states the BALANCE OF VOTING POWER which they believe was desired by the

writers of the Constitution. They are of the opinion that the presidency and the Congress

should have the same constituency   that this  would  lead to  more  harmonious relations

between executive and legislative branches and especially to a more responsive executive

branch.
     The fact that the  district  plan  WOULD  NOT  PREVENT the possibility of a minority

President is of far less importance to its advocates than the preservation of  the federal

system, which the district plan would achieve, in their opinion. Proponents state that any

system which preserves the federal principle  and  gives each state a  minimum of three

electoral votes  will  grant a  slightly greater voting power  to the smaller states.  "Indeed,

this was the original purpose of the  electoral  vote  bonus for smaller states,  so that the

GREATER  POPULATIONS  of  the large states could  NOT  DICTATE  the selection of

the President."1

1Senator Karl Mudt (R., S.D.) in a 1968 statement in the Villanova Law Review,

Volume 13, winter 1968.

       Critics  of  the  district  plan  insist it  would increase the influence of small states far

out of proportion to the size of their populations  while  drastically reducing the influence

of large states in which the votes are usually balanced rather evenly between the parties.

The effect of the plan would thus be "malapportioning the presidency in favor of the small

states and of homogeneous, one-party or near-one-party regions of the country."1

1"Electing Presidents," The New Republic, February 22, 1969, pp. 9-10.

     Some political writers and congressmen are convinced the district plan would INVITE

MINOR-PARTY  activity  and  might break up the  two-party system.  It is also thought the

district plan might reduce the likelihood of  an  election  producing a majority of electoral

votes and, hence, would increase the need for a run-off or some other kind of contingent

election to resolve the electoral vote deadlock.
     The disenfranchisement of defeated voters within any state would continue under the

district  system.   The vote  of a  PLURALITY  OF  A  STATE'S  VOTERS  could also be

negated under the district system, because in operation it is a multitude of winner-take-all

systems within each state. This makes it possible for a plurality of the votes state-wide to

be for a different party than that of the winners in most of the districts of the state.
     The district plan "would intensify the importance of district lines and thus aggravate

controversy over gerrymandering and other problems of apportionment."2

2Dr. Paul A. Freund, Harvard Law School and member of the ABA Commission on

Electoral College Reform.

 Although this plan would achieve a closer correspondence between the electoral vote

and the popular vote than does the existing state-wide winner-take-all system, its

operation does not correlate with degree of voter participation. Hence, a light voter

turnout can have the same weight as a heavy voter turnout, which is inequitable in the

opinion of some critics.

HISTORY OF THE DISTRICT PLAN
     The district plan was first introduced as a proposed amendment in 1800 and,

despite a great deal of discussion in Congress since that time, it has been voted

on only five times in the Senate and twice in the House of Representatives.
     Only one vote has been taken on the district plan in this century. In 1956, the

Daniel Substitute, which included a district plan, passed the Senate by 48 to 37

but did not win a two-thirds vote. The Daniel Substitute was an amendment to a

proposed constitutional amendment embodying a proportional plan. It proposed

that the state legislature would decide whether to count electoral votes by a

proportional or a district system.
     The floor debate was a basic power struggle between liberal-conservative,

urban-rural and party factions. Political realignment seemed inevitable if the Daniel

Substitute were passed. Under a district plan, the balance of Democratic power

would shift to the south because in the two-party states of the north, electoral votes

would be split between the parties fairly evenly. Republican conservative, rural

interests would increase in importance because of the shift in power away from

the large states and large cities, where liberal Republicans (like liberal Democrats)

had their hold.
     Major support for this type of reform has always come from persons who consider

the chief evil of the Electoral College system to be the general ticket or unit vote

method of casting electoral votes--the winner-take-all system.
     In the 90th Congress (1967-68), Senate sponsors of district plan resolutions

included Republican Senator Karl Mundt (S.D.), Strom Thurmond (S.C.), Norris

Cotton (N.H.), Hugh Scott (Pa.), Roman Hruska (Neb.), John Tower (Tex.), Peter

Dominick (Colo.), Len Jordan (Idaho), Hiram Fong (Hawaii) and Democratic

Senators John Stennis of Mississippi and Ernest Gruening of Alaska (no longer

in the Senate).

     In the house in 1967-68, sponsors were Democratic Representatives Thomas

Abernethy and Jamie Whitten of Mississippi and Representative M. G. Snyder of

Kentucky, a Republican who also sponsored a district plan in the 91st Congress.

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By George F. Will                          Thursday, October 12, 2006;

Sometimes the loveliest word in America's political lexicon is "VETO."

From: Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, "A Veto for Voters' Good"

California's governor has demonstrated virtue, understood as the good we do when no one is watching. With his state and the nation paying no attention to an anti-constitutional campaign

to alter the way presidents are chosen, Arnold Schwarzenegger has vetoed a bill that, had it

become law, would have imparted dangerous momentum to a recurring simple-mindedness.

The bill would have committed California to cast its electoral votes -- today, 55 -- for whichever candidate receives the most popular votes nationally. The commitment would have been

contingent on a compact with other similarly committed states, all having a combined

total of at least 270 electoral votes.

Such legislation has been introduced in six states and passed by Colorado's Senate.

Advocates offer two rationales:

First, California and other states that are not closely contested battlegrounds are

not "relevant." (A state with more than one-fifth of the electoral votes needed to win the

presidency is "irrelevant"? Please.) What is meant is that uncontested states are "neglected"

by presidential campaigns, so direct popular election of presidents -- the point of the

multi-state compact -- would increase voter interest in the many states (by one count, 37, 34

and 37 in the past three elections) that are not considered swing states.But it is disproportionate

to traduce, by simplification, sophisticated constitutional arrangements just to make campaigns

more stimulating for some states. Furthermore, the electoral vote system is a wholesome

political market: It provides steady incentives for parties to change the attributes that

make them uncompetitive in many states.

How long will the GOP be content not to contest California?

The system aims not just for majority rule but rule by certain kinds of majorities . It encourages candidates to form coalitions of states with various political interests and cultures.

Such coalitions can be assembled only by a politics of accommodation. So the electoral

college system discourages attempts to build narrow ideological or geographical majorities.

Today the system is helping the Democratic Party by nudging it to be less of a coastal

party -- less reliant on a risky 20-state strategy in presidential elections.

The second argument for the multi-state compact is: The possibility of the winner of the

popular vote losing the electoral vote contest violates the value that trumps all others -- majoritarianism. Well.  Never mind that in 42 of the 46 elections since 1824 (all but 1824,

1876,1888 and 2000) for which we have popular vote totals that did not happen.

Which suggests that the assault on the electoral vote system is driven by simplistic majoritarianism, which would shatter the two-party system that is conducive to temperate politics.

That electoral vote system (combined with the winner-take-all allocation of votes in all states

but Maine and Nebraska) makes it very difficult for third-party presidential candidates to be competitive. In 1992 Ross Perot won 18.9 percent of the popular vote but no state and therefore no electoralvotes. Direct popular election of presidents would be an incentive for fragmentation

of the electorate by the proliferation of factional candidacies.

Imagine 2008 with independent candidacies by, say, Colorado Rep. Tom Tancredo (deport illegal immigrants), Pennsylvania Rep. John Murtha (out of Iraq immediately), New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg (independence from the two parties is a virtue) and Jesse Jackson

(he would think of a reason). None could win, but cumulatively they could prevent the major-party winner from reaching even 40 percent. And the multi-state compact cannot include a runoff provision. That would require a constitutional amendment; 34 senators can prevent a constitutional

amendment from being sent to the states for ratification, and many more than 17 of the

smaller states benefit from the additional weight the electoral vote system gives them.

It is perverse that the 2000 election, which culminated with the lawyers' riot in

Florida, is cited to undermine an electoral vote system that prevented 2000 from being a

calamity. If, in presidential elections, popular votes were poured into by fewer votes

(118,574) than there were precincts (166,064), would unleash a coast-to-coast frenzy

of litigation -- about ballot design, voting hours, alleged voting-machine malfunctions, etc.

The electoral vote system quarantines electoral disputes to a few closely contested states.

Under the multi-state compact, Californians, who in 2004 supported John Kerry by a popular

vote margin of 1.2 million, would have seen their electoral votes swell President Bush's

winning margin. In 1960 and 1976, too, California's electoral votes would have

gone to candidates rejected by Californians.

• They should understand what their governor has demonstrated:
• Sometimes the loveliest word in America's political lexicon is "veto."

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        George Will             Political Astronomy, Bush vs Gore, 2000 Election

TO UNDERSTAND the presidential race, do as Percival Lowell did. Infer what is unseen from what is seen.

Lowell (1855-1916) was the American astronomer whose study of the orbit of Uranus revealed irregularities he thought could most reasonably be explained as effects of an unseen planet. This ignited a search that culminated in the discovery of Pluto.

The dynamic of today's presidential race, as those most intimately involved--the two campaigns--understand it, can be inferred from where they are investing television advertising money.

Consider California.

Given the number of electoral votes in the "Republican L" (go south from the Canadian border through the Mountain and Prairie states, turn east at Texas and cross the South to the Atlantic), California's 54 electoral votes--one-fifth of the 270 needed to win--are more vital to Democrats than to Republicans. And California's Republican Party has not won a U.S. Senate race since 1988; its 1998 gubernatorial candidate got just 38.4 percent of the vote; George Bush in 1992 and Bob Dole quickly quit contesting California, finishing with 32.6 and 38.2 percent of California's votes respectively. California had been considered safe for Al Gore.

So why is George W. Bush spending $1.5 million a week on television there--$1 million of it in Los Angeles? Because he is close enough to hope to win, or at least to force Gore to spend in California money that cannot be spent in, say, Florida.

Republicans have heard that during a recent week Gov. Gray Davis's nightly tracking polls showed Bush behind by three to five points--and ahead once. Recent Republican polling put Bush behind by 18 points in Los Angeles, but ahead by 12 to 14 points in the rest of the state. Then a respected public poll put Bush behind by just 4 points. On Oct. 17, Garry South, one of Gore's principal California strategists, warned that "it has closed up here," Bush is "resonating with people" and "we may have to spend some money here."

Perhaps South wants talk of a tightening race to energize the Democratic base for the sake of other candidates and ballot initiatives. However, some Republicans suspect that Davis might be dry-eyed if Gore loses. Ken Khachigian, a leading Republican consultant, mischievously says he suspects that there probably soon will be a Web site "DavisforPresident2004.com." (Funny Joke)

The number of states within reach of both candidates is growing rather than shrinking as Election Day nears. Bush did not expect to be worrying in late October about Nevada. Gore is moving television money into Tennessee and Arkansas, which is embarrassing. Bush is increasing his buys in West Virginia (since 1928 Republicans have carried it only in Eisenhower's, Nixon's and Reagan's landslides--1956, 1972, 1984), Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Oregon and Washington. Clinton carried all of those twice, and they were six of the 10 states Michael Dukakis carried in 1988.

Political astronomers adept at charting conflicting forces in the social solar system should study Michigan, where Bush could be hurt by a conservative measure--a splendid school choice voucher initiative targeted at failing inner-city schools--that could enlarge Michigan's turnout. It is supported by the Catholic hierarchy, whose schools would benefit from an enlargement of the pool of pupils empowered to exercise choice. But this initiative may increase the turnout of Catholics, including Democratic Catholics, and African Americans, who will vote for the initiative and for Gore.

The contest that has stirred the deepest passions nationally is not the national race. Rather, it is New York's Senate race. People trying to plot the effects of various political planets on one another should consider that if Gore loses, the optimum outcome for conservatives might be for Hillary Clinton to win. Instantly she would be the Democratic Party--much the most visible Democrat nationally and the leading aspirant for the 2004 presidential nomination. Her quest for the nomination would divide Democrats. Were she to win the nomination, she would be the weakest Democratic nominee since George McGovern, who in 1972 carried Massachusetts and the District of Columbia. And her candidacy probably would catalyze party-switching by a few conservative Democratic members of Congress.

On Nov. 7, for the sixth time in 10 elections, the nation will elect a southerner. (In the other four elections it chose Californians--Southern Californians.) This not only illustrates, redundantly, the political eclipse of the Northeast (that region's consolation prize is Connecticut's Joe Lieberman), it shows that both parties can reasonably hope to harvest electoral votes almost everywhere. Which is why the political planetarium has never presented a more complex picture.

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George Will          The Framers' Electoral wisdom

POLITICAL HYPOCHONDRIACS again are urging Americans to fear and be offended by the system of choosing presidents by electoral votes. Criticism of this system recurs whenever a close contest poses the possibility that a candidate might win an electoral vote victory while receiving fewer popular votes than his opponent. It is said, with more passion than precision, that this happened three times--1824, 1876, 1888.

Even if that is true, it means that in 50 of 53 elections since 1789--in 94 percent of elections, and in 27 consecutive elections--the system has not produced the outcome that troubles the sleep of its critics. Besides, the assertions about those elections can be true without being pertinent.

In 1824, before the emergence of the two-party system, all four candidates appeared on the ballots in only six of the 24 states. Six states, including New York, had no elections: Their state legislatures picked the electors. Nationally, only about 350,000 of the 4 million eligible white males voted. Andrew Jackson received 38,149 more votes than John Quincy Adams, but neither received a majority of electoral votes. So the House of Representatives decided, picking Adams. In 1888 fraud on both sides may have involved more votes than the victory margin (90,596).

There never has been an Electoral College victory by a candidate who lost the popular vote by a substantial margin. And only simple-minded majoritarianism holds that "the nation's will" would be "frustrated" and democracy "subverted" (this is the language of Electoral College abolitionists) were an electoral vote majority to go to a candidate who comes in a close second in the popular vote count. In such a case, the Framers' objective--a president chosen through state-by-state decisions--would be achieved.

The Electoral College has evolved, shaping and being shaped by the two-party system, which probably would not survive abandonment of winner-take-all allocation of electoral votes. Direct popular election of presidents, or proportional allocation of states' electoral votes, would incite minor parties to fractionate the electorate. This might necessitate runoff elections to guarantee that the eventual president got at least 40 percent of the vote--and runoffs might become auctions in which minor  parties sold their support.

The electoral vote system shapes the character of winning majorities. By avoiding proportional allocation of electoral votes, America's system--under which Ross Perot in 1992 got 19 percent of the popular votes and zero electoral votes--buttresses the dominance of two parties, and pulls them to the center, producing a temperate politics of coalitions rather than a proliferation of ideological factions with charismatic leaders.

Furthermore, choosing presidents by electoral votes is an incentive for candidates to wage truly national campaign
s, building majorities that are geographically as well as ideologically broad. Consider: Were it not for electoral votes allocated winner-take-all, would candidates campaign in, say, West Virginia? In 1996 Bill Clinton decisively defeated Bob Dole there 52 percent to 37 percent. But that involved a margin of just 93,866 votes (327,812 to 233,946), a trivial amount compared with what can be harvested in large cities. However, for a 5-0 electoral vote sweep, West Virginia is worth a trip or two.

Some Electoral College abolitionists argue that a candidate could get elected with just 27 percent of the popular vote--by winning the 11 largest states by just one vote in each, and not getting a single popular vote anywhere else. But it is equally pointless to worry that a candidate could carry Wyoming 220,000 to 0, could lose the other 49 states and the District of Columbia by an average of 4,400 votes, and be the popular vote winner while losing the electoral vote 535 to 3. Serious people take seriously probabilities, not mere possibilities. And abolitionists are not apt to produce what Madison was too sober to attempt, a system under which no unwanted outcome is even theoretically possible.

Critics of the Electoral College say it makes some people's votes more powerful than others'. This is true. In 1996, 211,571 Wyoming voters cast presidential ballots, awarding three electoral votes, one for every 70,523 voters, whereas 10,019,484 California voters awarded 54 electoral votes, one for every 185,546 voters.

So what? Do critics want to abolish the Senate as well? Delaware, the least populous state in 1789, understandably was the first to ratify the Constitution with its equal representation of states in the Senate: Virginia, the most populous, had 11 times more voters. Today Wyoming's senators' votes can cancel those of California's senators, who represent 69 times more people. If that offends you, so does America's constitutional federalism.

The electoral vote system, like the Constitution it serves, was not devised by, and should not be revised by, simple-minded majoritarians. 

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